Franco built 1.48 million subsidized homes; Sánchez has delivered 78,735

Franco built 1.48 million subsidized homes; Sánchez has delivered 78,735

How much affordable housing has Spain built in recent years? The short answer is: very little. Between 2018 and 2025, under Pedro Sánchez's government at La Moncloa, 78,735 subsidized homes were completed, an average of 9,842 a year. Between 1964 and 1971, at the height of the Franco dictatorship, 1,482,787 were finished, at a rate of 185,348 per year. The comparison, crude as it is, yields a factor of almost 19 to one. The figure is circulating with the BBVA Foundation cited as the source for the historical series, and a tally by governments since 1981 for the recent period. And with it comes an uncomfortable question: why does democracy build less social housing than the dictatorship did?

What counted as subsidized housing in the sixties

Before drawing conclusions, it is worth looking at the scope of the statistics. Under the Plan Nacional de Vivienda 1961-1976 (the national housing plan of the era), most of what was built in Spain fell under some form of protection scheme: limited-rent, subsidized or union-run housing. We are talking about two-thirds or more of all construction, often developed by private builders who received interest-free advances, tax breaks and land expropriated by the State. The Instituto Nacional de la Vivienda (the National Housing Institute) covered up to 75% of the eligible budget in the most modest categories, and the Obra Sindical del Hogar (the regime's housing agency) built homes directly.

That does not invalidate the figure. It explains it. The public machinery of the sixties was a monoculture: nearly all construction went through the same hoop. Today the hoop is narrow and the private developer looks the other way.

The price of a subsidized flat in 1968

Another figure making the rounds in the same corners: an 80-square-meter subsidized flat in a big city cost in 1968 the equivalent of 240 euros in monthly rent and around 250,000 pesetas to buy, roughly 52,000 euros in today's money. With an average salary of 8,000 pesetas a month, buying it took about 32 months. Today, using the same parameters, the range stretches to 16 years. The calculation is rough — it ignores wage inflation and the quality of the housing stock — but it points in one direction: subsidized housing back then was genuinely affordable.

The counterargument: without freedom there is no merit

The defense of the Franco-era figure runs into an obvious wall. The dictatorship built a lot and cheap, yes, but it also executed, imprisoned and silenced people. Some argue that the achievement of construction does not offset the political price; against that stands the fact that the comparison is with a democracy that prides itself on being social and fails to prove it in public housing.

The conversation drifted toward maintenance. Some claim that the apartment blocks of the development era are racking up special levies of more than 600,000 euros for structural repairs and floor slabs, which raises the question of whether building a lot and badly is a better deal than building little and well. The answer is not settled.

Why the current government does not repeat the trick

The logical question: if the problem is supply, why not build 1.5 million homes and hand them out? The obstacles are land, financing and the legal framework. The State no longer has the power to expropriate and develop land that the INV had, and the public budget competes with healthcare, pensions and debt. The subsidized housing completed in eight years does not even reach 6% of the Franco-era figure.

The chart of the historical series, with its peak in the sixties and the subsequent collapse, leaves an image that needs no adjectives.

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In the end, the discussion is not about Franco. It is about whether this country is capable of building affordable housing without a dictator signing the decrees. With these numbers, the answer is still no.