Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo also doesn't get the Ayuso penthouse

The Chamberí penthouse: a €6 million purchase that unsettles even the PP

In April, the Community of Madrid bought a nearly 500-square-metre penthouse in the Chamberí district, valued at €6 million, presumably to house Isabel Díaz Ayuso's office while Puerta del Sol was being renovated. The deal, carried out through the public agency Planifica Madrid, became known this week and has sparked a controversy that the regional government has failed to contain. Twenty-four hours after the leak, the executive announced it would sell the property and donate the proceeds to fire victims. The U-turn, far from calming things, has reinforced suspicions.

The conservative press demands answers

The most striking thing about the case is that critics are not only on the left. El Mundo and ABC, newspapers traditionally close to the PP, have published editorials demanding that Ayuso explain herself. "A strange operation that Ayuso is obliged to explain," headlined El Mundo. ABC spoke of "unease in the PP" over the crisis. And the icing on the cake came from Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo, a PP MP, when asked by Natalia Junquera in El País whether she understood the penthouse affair, she replied curtly: "No, not yet." A dart that could only come from her own benches.

The accumulating suspicions

The official justification that the penthouse would serve as a temporary office does not hold up: it is a residential property with a 200-square-metre terrace, with no possible institutional use. Furthermore, the penthouse is opposite the home of Ayuso's mother, and months earlier her partner, Alberto González Amador, had put his two penthouses up for sale, allegedly acquired with profits from deals with Quirón and the masks. For some analysts, the full sequence fits an attempt to transfer the penthouse to Ayuso at zero cost. Others see it as a "colossal blunder" with no incivil intent, but with an avoidable political cost. There is also a theory that the case has been stirred from within the PP, with an eye to eroding the president ahead of the succession. The shadow of a "Cifuentes" hangs over the narrative.

A transparency problem with legal ramifications

The file accumulates opacity. Neither the exact price paid by Planifica Madrid nor the content of the administrative file has been disclosed. The opposition, led by Más Madrid, has already filed a lawsuit and expects the Prosecutor's Office to open proceedings. The alleged embezzlement of public funds, if confirmed, would carry a disqualification from office. Meanwhile, the penthouse mess overshadows other economic debates, such as the rise in mortgages that is hitting households again this month. The feeling that the elite helps itself with a ladle is not stopped even by the fact that the funds are destined for fire victims.

The case remains open: while waiting for the government to provide the data, the noise does not cease. And when a party is forced to give explanations even within its own ranks, something has shifted.