Housing cooperatives on assignment of use: a real alternative to homeownership and tenancy in Spain?

Abstract

The international financial crisis, fueled by the expansion of homeownership and the lack of regulation of irresponsible mortgage lending, has significantly affected some European countries, such as Spain, in particular on the access to affordable housing in homeownership or tenancy. This has triggered the rise of the so-called co-housing or collaborative housing as a novel way to access housing, which in Spain has been implemented mainly thanks to housing cooperatives on assignment of use. This paper explores how this model can be an alternative to traditional land tenures in Spain, homeownership and tenancy, that is, if it can create a third real estate market providing enough legal security, flexibility and affordability or it is an alternative way that, for the time being, cannot be generalized. In order to do so, the main problems that are currently detected are addressed and analysed based on their legal configuration at the state and regional levels with some references to comparative law.