Rents are becoming ever more expensive, property prices keep climbing, and salaries no longer stretch far enough to live on. Finding affordable housing in San Marino is turning into an increasingly serious problem. The warning comes from the R.E.T.E. movement, which accuses the government of failing to tackle with sufficient resolve an emergency that continues to weigh on Sammarinese families.
A year and a half after the new housing law was approved, the movement argues that the situation has not improved. If anything, over the past six months rental and sale prices are said to have risen further still, making it increasingly difficult to find a home.
What weighs most heavily is the gap between costs and salaries. An 80-square-metre apartment can cost as much as 1,000 euros a month, even in areas with no particular prestige. That is a difficult sum to sustain for anyone earning between 1,600 and 1,800 euros.
“Beyond the personal complaints we’ve received, you only need to pick up any weekly property listings magazine to see the prices being asked — even in areas with nothing particularly special about them, 80 square metres can go for 1,000 euros in rent.
Taking this into account, and bearing in mind that the average salary varies depending on the contract, category and so on, a wage of around 1,600 to 1,800 euros, in our view, no longer guarantees people a dignified standard of living,” observes Gabriele Vitali, R.E.T.E.’s deputy political secretary.
The consequences, the movement warns, fall disproportionately on single-income families, on young couples who give up having children for financial reasons, and on citizens forced to look for housing outside the Republic.
Also under scrutiny are property speculation and the concentration of the market in the hands of a few operators, alongside what R.E.T.E. sees as an institutional stance too favourable toward big developers and too inattentive to the needs of the population.
Hence the call on the government for “a strong response and a genuine analysis”, after the executive, according to the movement, has shown that it has “not grasped the severity” of the situation.
To discuss possible solutions, R.E.T.E. is organising a public meeting open to all citizens on Thursday 12 November at 9 p.m., in the Sala Joe Cassar in Borgo Maggiore, to which trade unions, social partners and trade associations have also been invited.
The aim is to bring together the different voices from across the territory, gather proposals, and identify concrete measures to make San Marino’s housing market more accessible.
