Nearly five million rental contracts face a political shock. Junts plans to reject the housing decrees unless the Government rewrites the main text before Friday's vote.
Congress is due to vote on both decrees on 2 October 2026. Reuters reported that the Government was still looking for room to negotiate before the vote. Nearly five million rental contracts are caught in the dispute.
Junts says the package is only a temporary fix. The party also says it could reduce the rental supply and push prices higher.
The party has agreed to reject the measures. That puts the Government under pressure.
It now has several choices. It could renegotiate the main decree, withdraw it or turn the dispute into an election issue. An early election is among the possibilities mentioned in the source material. For tenants and vulnerable households, the immediate question is whether the protections will become law.
The Government split the housing measures into two decrees in an attempt to secure approval for at least part of the package in Spain’s fragmented Congress.
Junts announced its position after an emergency online meeting of its executive committee. Secretary-general Jordi Turull called the meeting. Míriam Nogueras, the party's spokeswoman in Congress, had already said Junts was ready to accept the political cost.
Nogueras is expected to demand the withdrawal of the broader economic decree. She will also ask the Council of Ministers to approve a new version. If the Government refuses, Junts will vote against it.
The Government is still trying to change that outcome. Secretary of State for Housing Leire Iglesias told RNE that withdrawing the decree would not be the best course. She said the executive would try to renegotiate the text before the vote.
Demócrata also reported the Housing Ministry's position. The ministry rejects the claim that the decrees would hurt housing supply or inheritance. It says some of Junts' demands are already in the package.
The deadline is close.
The second decree has already been published in Spain’s Official State Gazette. It provides for compensation equivalent to at least one year of rent when a landlord unjustifiably refuses to renew a tenancy, according to ARA.
The dispute has moved beyond Congress. Demonstrations at Madrid's Puerta del Sol are expected to continue. More cities are joining the mobilisation.
Protesters also held a large casserole demonstration outside Madrid City Hall in Cibeles. They demanded approval of both housing decrees.
The immediate trigger was the eviction of Maricarmen, an 87-year-old woman with a disability. She had lived in her home for more than seven decades. Riot police were deployed during the operation.
Her case turned housing policy into a street confrontation. Protesters are expected to continue regardless of the vote in the lower house.
Junts had already rejected a housing decree in April with the other right-wing parties. Several reported suicides were linked in the source material to housing debts and eviction threats. After those cases and the eviction of Maricarmen, parties other than PP and Vox appeared to move closer to a common position.
That alignment did not last.
The new dispute broke it before the measures could pass.
The larger text is Real Decreto-ley 26/2026, which has already been published in the BOE. It includes measures associated with Sumar, although it carries the PSOE's signature.
The smaller decree contains Sumar's central housing demand. It also includes the proposal backed by the Sindicato de Inquilinas: indefinite rental contracts comparable to employment contracts.
Reuters reported that this second text was initially seen as almost certain to fail. The Government did not have enough votes in the fragmented Congress.
The broader decree would extend eviction protection for vulnerable people without alternative housing until 31 December 2030. The protection would apply when the claimant is a large property owner or an investment fund.
Tenants who are up to date with their payments could also request an extraordinary extension of up to two years. The rule would cover contracts expiring before 31 December 2028.
Another provision would cap annual rent updates at 2% until 2027. Rentals already above the Government's reference index would face a full freeze.
Investment funds and similar entities would be barred from buying homes below 70% of their assessed value until 2028.
Seasonal rentals and room rentals would come under the LAU. Landlords would have to justify the temporary use. Combined room rents could not exceed the price of the entire property.
Demócrata also listed the regulation of seasonal and room rentals, limits on speculative purchases through the end of 2028 and the two-year extension for some existing contracts as central parts of the first decree.
The package proposes a 10% income-tax deduction for tenants earning below 33,007.20 euros. Owners who cut rents could receive tax benefits of up to 100%.
Owners who raise rents by more than 20% could face penalties of up to 15%. The text also sets a 10% VAT rate for tourist apartments from December and a 4% rate for newly built protected housing.
First-home buyers could receive interest-free ICO loans of up to 50,000 euros. Empty homes could face property-tax surcharges of up to 150%.
The plan would raise the tax on socimi profits from 15% to 25%. It also includes 2 billion euros in state guarantees to expand social and affordable rental housing.
Those measures give the vote wider political stakes. The package covers eviction safeguards, rent controls, taxation, tourist housing, first-home finance and investment rules.
Junts' rejection puts much of the Government's housing strategy at risk. Withdrawal would expose the PSOE to the political cost of abandoning measures it accepted only recently.
The timing is the central problem. A package designed to contain the housing crisis now depends on a party that says the package does not go far enough.
