Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversiones S.L. waited two years before speaking out about the eviction that put 87-year-old Maricarmen at the center of Spain’s housing debate. The company’s public defense has drawn a backlash: tenants and lawyers dispute its claims, and official records challenge them.
The company’s basic argument is that it never asked Maricarmen to pay more rent than before. It points to talks about a “bonified” rent, supposedly 40 to 50% below market. But Beatriz Duro, the tenants’ lawyer, says Urbagestión itself set the new rent at 1,650 euros per month, an amount Maricarmen could not pay. The company’s technical defense is that it did not “demand” that amount, only made it a condition for a new contract. Maricarmen had to leave.
Information from BBC and Reuters, Maricarmen had lived in her Madrid apartment since 1956, spending nearly 70 years in the same home before her eviction at age 87.
Urbagestión also claims the Ministry of Housing and Casa 47 never made an offer to buy the property. Ministry sources say an offer was made, after which Urbagestión “cut off contact instantly.” The same thing happened when a 900-euro rent split between Maricarmen and the Ministry was proposed. Even a last-minute offer from a well-known writer to pay Maricarmen’s debt and rent went unanswered. Calls from officials also got no response as the eviction date approached.
The company’s statement accuses the Sindicato de Inquilinas of “pressures, intentional disqualifications and disproportionate and unjustified coercion.” Urbagestión is now seeking 10,000 euros for being called a “fondo buitre.” Carolina Vilariño, the union’s spokesperson, says its only “offense” was describing what happened. She says Urbagestión refused to negotiate a less traumatic handover. Maricarmen got just half an hour to collect essentials and was blocked from retrieving the rest of her belongings.
Urbagestión’s statement points to the Madrid Provincial Court and, later, the Supreme Court, both of which upheld the eviction. The reason was that Maricarmen’s rental contract had been subrogated twice, first to her mother and then to her. The union never said the eviction was illegal; it calls it unjust and illegitimate. It also points to Franco-era laws that barred women from signing rental contracts, a rule that left Maricarmen exposed decades later.
EFE and Spanish media report that Urbagestión, operating as Urbagesa, specializes in buying buildings with tenants for later revaluation and resale after eviction and renovation. At the time of Maricarmen’s case, the company had nearly 300 pharmacies for sale across about 20 Spanish cities and was managed by brothers Ricardo and Fernando Alonso.
Urbagestión says it “tolerated” Maricarmen’s stay for three years after her contract was voided, supposedly out of a “pacifying spirit.” Yet as soon as the company bought the building in 2018, it told Maricarmen it wanted her out. It never offered rent she could actually pay.
The company also questions Maricarmen’s history in the flat. Urbagestión claims she did not live there for 70 years straight, pointing to a short period in 2001 when she was registered in Collado Mediano. Official records show she left for just four months for work, then returned home.
The case has changed the national conversation, and, as reported earlier, the government was forced to respond. Urbagestión’s latest statement has made the power gap between corporate landlords and vulnerable tenants more obvious.
