Maricarmen was removed from her Retiro home after a final court ruling. The dispute centred on a lease signed in 1956 and two successive transfers.
The judicial commission arrived at the Madrid property on 23 September 2026. Police were there. Protesters gathered outside as officials enforced the eviction of 87-year-old Maricarmen.
She had lived in the apartment for decades under a tenancy agreement signed in 1956. The final ruling said the contract ended after the legal limit on its second succession.
The removal followed an order issued after the Supreme Court left the Madrid Provincial Court's decision in force. The case also drew a political reaction across Spain.
Maricarmen reportedly moved into the apartment as a teenager with her parents and lived there for roughly 70 years before the eviction.
The dispute was not about whether Maricarmen had succeeded to the tenancy. The Supreme Court focused on how long the agreement could continue after that succession.
Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversión S.L. asked the courts to recover the home. The company argued that the second succession could not last for life.
That transfer followed Maricarmen's mother's death in 2005. The contract had already passed once, in 1960, after the death of its first holder.
The first-instance court initially rejected the owner's claim. In its ruling of 27 January 2022, Madrid's Court of First Instance number 90 said the property owner had tacitly accepted Maricarmen as the tenant.
She had continued living in the apartment and paying rent for years. The owners had acted in a way that matched that tenancy.
Reports cited in coverage of the case say Maricarmen had a recognised disability of 50 percent. That was below the 65 percent threshold linked to the exception that could have allowed the tenancy to continue until the tenant's death under the interpretation applied by the courts.
The appeal changed the case. On 30 June 2022, the Ninth Section of the Madrid Provincial Court partly upheld Urbagestión's appeal and declared the 1956 lease terminated.
The judges applied transitional provision Second B of the 1994 Urban Tenancy Law. Under their reading, the second succession lasted two years unless the tenant met the exception for a disability of at least 65 percent.
Onda Cero and other Spanish outlets reported that Maricarmen's disability was assessed at 50 percent. The court said the requirements for extending the agreement until her death had not been proved.
The ruling did not remove her at once. Although the contract was treated as expired two years after the 2005 succession, Maricarmen kept paying rent and stayed in the home.
The Provincial Court treated those payments as a tacit renewal. The tenancy therefore continued through annual extensions.
Ownership changed in June 2018. Urbagestión acquired the property, told Maricarmen it was the new owner, and provided a bank account for future rent payments.
The rent was updated under the 1994 law. Later, the company asked her to prove conditions tied to the succession. Those included a disability above 65 percent and registered residence in the property.
The court rejected the argument that these actions stopped the owner from seeking termination. The legal dispute continued.
Maricarmen appealed to the Supreme Court. In an order dated 13 December 2023, the court refused to admit the appeal and left the Provincial Court's judgment final.
A previous court report on this publication's legal news pages covers another case involving Josep Juanpere and a prison order. You can read it here. The Retiro case turned on the duration of an old tenancy succession.
The record shows the clash between continued rent payments and the legal limits on inherited leases. Maricarmen's long occupation and the owner's acceptance of payments shaped the first ruling.
They did not overturn the later reading of the 1994 law. EL PAÍS and Euronews reported that the case also became a public symbol of Spain's unresolved "renta antigua" contracts. Many of those agreements began under older rental rules.
The eviction followed the final decision on the contract's duration. It was not a ruling that denied the second succession had taken place.
