Building more homes won't fix Spain's housing crisis while foreign arrivals keep surging

There are two competing diagnoses. One calls for more housing supply to bring prices down; the other argues that won't work if the population keeps growing and calls for tackling migratory demand.

## The supply-side prescription: build so prices fall

The classic liberal argument is simple: if there are more homes available than people looking for them, prices fall. Hundreds of thousands get built and supply increases. It's the prescription usually called for in the industry.

The problem is that construction needs workers. And those workers, wherever they come from, need somewhere to live. If entire crews are imported to put up the buildings, those same people add housing demand in the very market that is meant to become cheaper.

During the property boom, Spain started more homes than **France, Italy and Germany** combined. Prices kept rising anyway.

## When demand grows faster than supply

Another approach focuses on who is demanding. Spain had **40 million** inhabitants in 1998 and tops **48.6 million** in 2025, according to the INE. One circulating argument holds that around **90%** of those arrivals come from the Americas, not Africa. It is a disputed figure, not an officially cited statistic.

On that basis, some propose reducing migratory demand: deporting those without an employment contract, stripping nationality from anyone without a parent born in Spain, banning the hiring of foreigners while unemployed Spaniards are registered —as is done in **Switzerland** and **Andorra**— and restricting tourist visas from South America and Africa.

## What it would cost to touch demand

A retroactive revocation of nationality would require reforming the **Constitution**, something no party with parliamentary representation has seriously proposed. Cutting work permits would lower social spending, but also tax revenue if those people were already employed.

Defenders of that path argue wages would rise as competition from cheap labour disappears. Opponents warn of a direct blow to sectors such as construction, hospitality or farming. The issue involves money and law: it's worth consulting official sources before drawing conclusions.