The municipal Territory Department has carried out a study on the evolution of tourist housing in Calpe in recent years, analysing the applications to convert residential dwellings for tourist use since 2017 with data from the Town Hall's own records manager and those of Tourism Valencian Community.
The data shows an exponential growth since 2017 except for 2020 and 2021 presumably due to the effects of the pandemic. In 2017, 441 tourist housing certificates were requested compared to the 985 requested in 2024 up to the current month. In other words, the City Council has received 985 applications in eight months to give a tourist use to residential dwellings. In 2019, 671 certificates were requested, in 2022 there were 630 and in 2023 the figure of 932 tourist housing certificates was reached.
Last June, the Town Council set up the first meeting of the working group, made up of technicians, politicians and representatives of the sectors involved, to study the housing situation in Calpe, the aim of which is to analyse the different solutions within the municipal competence framework, to determine solutions and actions aimed at achieving the objective of affordable and decent housing.
In this first meeting, the need to control and limit tourist housing was already addressed. Previously, the Town Council agreed to suspend the change of use from commercial premises to housing. In recent years, the proliferation of tourist housing far in excess of residential housing has caused problems of access to housing in the municipality.
The councillor for Territorial Planning, Juan Manuel del Pino, pointed out that ‘tourist accommodation has broken the housing market, tourist accommodation has raised prices exorbitantly and this has resulted in a social problem. We are very aware of the problem of access to housing and we are working on various lines to balance the housing situation in the municipality’.