house

A remote town in Soria attracted neighbors by offering them a house and bar. Two months later they left due to the cold

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Beratón is a small municipality in Moncayo, province of Soria, which stands out for its high altitude (the largest in the province) and reduced census (38 inhabitants, according to the INE). However, in recent weeks it has left one of the clearest examples of how difficult it is to keep pace with the depopulation of the ’emptied Spain’. A few months ago, its City Council tried to attract residents by offering a “business + housing” combo that managed to awaken the interest of a young couple from Cuenca. They didn’t even last three months. The cold and the drop in activity have led them to pack their bags again. It could be just an anecdote, but it illustrates how complicated it is to reactivate rural Spain. Even when there is good disposition and ideas. What has happened? That Beratón (Soria) has left one of those stories that, although a priori may seem simple and anecdotal, reflect much more complex trends. In May, the municipality made the news because its City Council launched an unusual announcement: whoever agreed to manage the town’s tavern would have at their disposal a newly renovated house. Business and housing guaranteed. “All kinds of facilities will be provided,” the mayor insistedCarmen Lapeña, on the SER Soria network, who also recalled that Beratón was a popular point for hikers and groups who came to Moncayo to spend the day. And it worked? Yes. The offer attracted a familya young couple from Cuenca. His arrival was doubly good news: not only did he swell Beratón’s meager census, but in theory it would serve to reactivate the town’s main point of socialization. The joy, however, was short-lived. A few days ago our colleagues from Straight to the Palate revealedciting SER, that the new residents have not lasted even two months there. They packed their bags at the end of December, which does not prevent the mayor from continuing to think about attracting new blood for the town. Of course, starting in March, when temperatures begin to rise and the town regains activity little by little. Why are they gone? The couple’s decision is actually little surprising. To start Beratón it becomes a cold place in winter, with temperatures that often fall below zero. “The winter months are very hard,” acknowledges the councilor, who for that reason rules out trying to bring in new families during January and February, “bad times.” However, the weather is only part of the problem. After all, there are other icy locations (even more than Berathon) who have no difficulties in attracting hoteliers. Its other big problem is depopulation and especially the ups and downs of the census. Although the INE has registered there 38 inhabitantsactually that’s just a reference. Although during the summer months the town welcomes more than 300 residentsin the harshest months of winter it is left with a handful of inhabitants stable, just half a dozen. The figure is so low that it is difficult to maintain the profitability of a business, even if it is a bar. “The days are very short, very cold… sad. People come, but punctually.” Is it a unique case? The story of Beratón includes some of its own ingredients, but its underlying problem is not very different from that faced by other parts of ’emptied Spain’ that find it difficult to stop the population drain. If at the beginning of this century there were in Spain 934 municipalities With less than 100 inhabitants, in 2021 that figure had risen to 1,379. Of the slow emptying of ’emptied Spain’ echoed before the pandemic the Spanish Rural Development Network (REDR) and the problem does not seem to be subsiding. The latest data from the INE show that the club of localities with less than a hundred registered residents has added thirty municipalities in the last five years, remaining at over 1,400 as of 2025. Is it that complicated? It seems so. In Galicia we found other cases which, although again they may seem anecdotal, help to better understand the general trend. There are rural town councils there that are taking over businesses such as gas stations and stores to prevent them from closing, which would be equivalent to running out of services and further accelerating their decline. It may seem excessive, but a recent report from the Consello de Contas warns that in Galicia there are almost a hundred of towns in ‘danger of extinction’, many of them located in A Coruña and Lugo. In Spain, in fact, there are already ‘ghost towns’ for sale. Why’s that? Due to a combination of factors: rural exodus, poor communications, difficulties in finding employment or establishing a long-term life project… For a time the pandemic, reconnection with nature and teleworking seemed to clear the future of some towns, but that ‘renaissance’ it didn’t always stick. In the background there is another problem, much more complex: housing. It is one thing that when we visit rural areas of Spain we see empty houses and quite another that those same properties are available for people interested in taking advantage of them or are habitable. How to solve it? The big question. In rural areas there are also second residencetourism-oriented housing, constructions whose ownership has become blurred over the decades and others that do not directly meet the necessary conditions to welcome new tenants. “The legislation gives city councils weapons to act in case of ruin, but we are so small and with so few resources that we cannot execute the laws,” he lamented in 2024 Enrique Collada, mayor of Alcarria, a town of 71 inhabitants in Guadalajara. Similar message launches the Tierras Sorianas del Cid Association: “There is a lot of empty housing or housing with residual use that we should try to put on the market.” The objective: escape the effects of demographic winter. Another thing (as has happened in Beratón) is the rigors of the climatic winter. Images | Beratón Town Hall and Miguel Á. Garcia (Flickr) In Xataka … Read more

the replica of his house

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It happened in October 2012. The Internet had discovered what seemed like a program whose existence was unknown to ordinary mortals: the complex used by Navy SEAL Team 6 to train in the raid against Osama bin Laden in Pakistan was still visible in Bing satellite view. The surprise was huge: an identical model of Laden’s refuge in Abbottabad had been built in the United States. From then until now, Washington has perfected the tactic. From the laboratory to the real assault. The capture of Nicolás Maduro It was not an adventurous improvisation nor a bet on chaos, but rather the almost literal execution of a plan. rehearsed for months in a controlled environment. Before helicopters, fighters and drones crossed Venezuelan airspace, the United States had already traveled that path dozens of times in Kentucky, within a life size replica from the shelter where the Venezuelan leader spent his nights. Walls, reinforced doors, interior routes and reaction times were studied to the extreme, in the same way that had been done fourteen years before with the Abbottabad complex. The logic is simple and brutal: reduce reality to a technical problem, turn a real assault into a repetition of training, and almost completely eliminate the friction of the unexpected. Abbottabad as a manual. The operation against Osama bin Laden in 2011 marked a before and after in the US doctrine of high value operations. So the CIA and JSOC built replicas of the Pakistani compound, analyzed the target’s life patterns for months, and rehearsed every move to the hilt. In fact, published the programs of the models used. The use of human intelligence, persistent surveillance, and physical target simulation allowed the SEALs to enter a sovereign country, execute the mission, and leave within minutes. Venezuela shows that that was no exception history, but the birth of a method. Everything that worked with Bin Laden (replications, life patterns, repeated trials, night execution and rapid withdrawal) has been reapplied almost point by point in Caracas. Replica of Bin Laden’s house developed by the CIA Replica of Bin Laden’s house developed by the CIA The eye that does not blink. One element connects Abbottabad and Caracas especially clearly: the use of RQ-170 Sentinel. We are talking about a stealth drone, designed to monitor high-value targets in hostile environments, which was key both in Pakistan as in Venezuela. Its mission is not to attack, but to observe without being seen, establish routines, confirm presences and offer information in real time during the assault. In the case of Maduro, the TWZ analysts that the Sentinel would have orbited for weeks to fine-tune every detail of your daily life and, already in operation, to feed the command centers with live images and data. It is the modern equivalent of the all-seeing surveillance, but with sensors capable of turning an entire city into a dashboard readable from thousands of kilometers away. The qualitative leap of the objective. The big difference between Abbottabad and Caracas is not in the technique, but rather in the target range. Bin Laden was the leader of a terrorist organization hiding in a private compound. Maduro was the head of a sovereign state, protected by regular armed forces and housed in military facilities. Replicating the same methodology for him implies an escalation enormous political and strategic. If in 2011 the United States demonstrated that could enter Pakistan to eliminate an enemy, in Venezuela he has shown that he can kidnap an active president, take him out of the country and do it without own casualties. The implicit message is much more disturbing: there is no rank, position or border that makes someone untouchable if Washington decides otherwise. The final lesson. If you also want, the comparison between Bin Laden and Maduro leaves a conclusion that is difficult to ignore. United States has perfected a doctrine which combines human intelligence, stealth aerial surveillance, physical simulation of the target and special forces to turn the capture of a specific person into an almost industrial problem. First it is rehearsed, then it is executed. First you observe it for months, then you act in minutes. From that prism, the Venezuela operation It does not inaugurate anything new, but it does confirm something essential: everything learned in Abbottabad is not only still valid, but has been expanded and normalized. The strategic lesson in this sense is clear and deeply uncomfortable for the rest of the planet: if Washington sets its mind to it, today it has the ability to capture practically any individual on the planet, in almost any place, and at the time it deems appropriate. Image | INC In Xataka | For 150 aircraft to bomb Venezuela, the US used one of the most lethal tactics of the war: gunboat diplomacy In Xataka | Someone bet $30,000 that Maduro would fall the night before he fell. He has won $400,000

While Big Brother sinks, ‘The House of Twins 2’ triumphs with a wild, online and unfiltered reality show

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This past December 7, a digital reality show achieved what seemed impossible: surpassing the format that for decades had been the undisputed king of Spanish reality shows, ‘Big Brother’. ‘La Casa de los Gemelos 2’, produced by brothers Carlos and Daniel Ramos for YouTube and Kick, attracted more than 200,000 simultaneous viewers during its inaugural gala. The figure is especially significant when compared to the parallel collapse of ‘Big Brother 20’, which Mediaset has been forced to cancel early after registering historic audience lows. But what is broken is not the format, but how it is presented. The first edition. How we count on your daythe first edition of ‘The House of Twins’, released on October 12, 2025, raised questions about the limits of unfiltered entertainment. That experiment, an imitation of ‘Big Brother’ that worked with the fauna cultivated in the Twins’ debates, completely lacked structure: there was no presenter or rules, and the Ramos trusted that the mere coexistence of explosive TikTok personalities would generate content for a full week. The result was both an operational disaster and a viral phenomenon. The program reached peaks of 48,000 viewers connected simultaneously and exceeded one million accumulated views in just nine hours of broadcast. The house became the scene of physical fights between contestants such as La Marrash and La Falete, there was visible consumption of alcohol and substances, destruction of furniture and moments of tension that they bordered on criminal. The program was emergency canceled in the early hours of October 13. A subsequent debate attracted 150,000 spectators and became trending topics number one in Spain. Reality television without filters. The next step was to professionalize the format, but without losing that fundamental idea along the way. And the Ramos bet heavily on this new iteration. As revealed by Kiko Hernández himself in the program ‘We are nobody’, the production has a budget of more than 600,000 euros, a figure well above what is usual in Spanish digital entertainment. The prize for the winner is doubled compared to the first edition: 100,000 euros for those who resist until December 31. Familiar faces. The creators have gone directly to the Mediaset ecosystem and derivatives: José Labrador, from ‘Gandía Shore’; Eros Vidal and Gabriella Barbu, from ‘Temptation Island’; Nissy Lahr, from ‘Secret Story’, make up a core of personalities that the Spanish public already knows. Them they add up Kiko Hernández as master of ceremonies, Víctor Sandoval as “dictator” of the house, and Coto Matamoros as “executioner” in charge of punishments. To bait the audience. From the first moment at the premiere, audiences skyrocketed and the program became trending on social networks. Among the most significant moments, an accidental nude of La Marrash during a moment of lack of control or the reunion between Kiko Hernández and Coto Matamoros, two figures who had not met on screen since ‘Crónicas Marcianas’, and between whom great tension was palpable. Kiko took the opportunity to attack Mediaset and to the fame that ‘Big Brother’ drags: “There has never been a rape here, right?”, he said in reference to the case of Carlota Prado in ‘Big Brother Revolution’. The ‘Big Brother’ disaster. While ‘The House of Twins 2’ celebrated its digital success, ‘Big Brother 20’ was the star of the most resounding failure in the history of the format. The premiere in September 2024 it barely achieved a 17.4% sharesetting the program’s worst inaugural mark. But the decline accelerated week after week until hitting rock bottom in November with a devastating 11.3% share and only 636,000 viewers. The panic in Mediaset was unleashed with the abrupt cancellation of the daily strip and erratic programming decisions. The domino effect reached the entire chain: Telecinco closed November with a 9% monthly quota, its worst historical record for that month, chaining five consecutive months under the 10% threshold. On December 5, Mediaset decided close the program before Christmasproducing a triple expulsion to accelerate the pace of the programs. Two months in broadcast, record down. The problem is not the format. Some analysts talk about a flat casting and without charisma, too sweetened content, and viewers have complained that practices that gave excitement to the galas, such as on-set interviews, have been abandoned. ‘The House of Twins 2’ recovered precisely the elements that made the original ‘Big Brother’ great: 24-hour retransmission without manipulative editing, authentic profiles even if they are uncomfortable, and freedom for conflicts to develop organically. While Telecinco must comply with strict regulations on child protection schedules, advertising limits and content control, the Ramos brothers operate on YouTube and Kick with almost total freedom which allows them to experiment without corsets. The program allows itself the morbidity and transgression that the public demands, but without the restrictions that paralyze conventional television. In Xataka | ‘Temptation Island’ is one of the few things that works on Telecinco. So much so that they are already recording a new season

We Spaniards are stopping having Christmas trees because they don’t fit in our house. So there are already companies renting them

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The year or the city doesn’t matter. At least in Spain, Christmas usually comes accompanied by a series of images that are repeated December after December, invariably: streets full of colored ledsbalconies in which they begin to appear papanoels and other Christmas decorations, shop windows in which gold, silver and reddish colors suddenly predominate… and living rooms in which trees full of tinsel and garlands sprout overnight. Year after year the same questions are also repeated: better natural or artificial tree? And above all… What the hell do we do with it after Epiphany, when it’s time to pick up the decorations? Where do we store it, if we already have the storage room all the way up? There are those who have seen In those doubts a promising business. Tree Earrings. There is no Christmas without decorations. And there is no Christmas decoration worth its salt without a good tree. It’s been like this all our lives, but just in case there were any doubts, cities like Vigo, Barcelona, Badalona either Madriddetermined to build gigantic trees in the heart of the urban area. Something similar happens in businesses, offices and homes. People demand trees (both artificial and natural), something that is felt in the nurseries and the big chains of decoration. As a reference, the National Christmas Tree Association (NCTA) estimates that each year they are sold in the US between 25 and 30 million of natural Christmas trees, which requires a huge plantation with hundreds of millions of copies distributed throughout the country. The dilemma, whether you choose real or fake fir trees, is… What to do with them later? A question, a business. There are those who have seen that question and the demand for Christmas trees as a business. After all… Why rack your brains choosing decorations, assembling them, disassembling them and then looking for a place to store them for months if we can pay a company to take care of everything? Or better yet, what if instead of buying the tree we rented it? Leasing trees may sound strange, but there comes a quick search on Google to find a few companies that operate in Spain and they dedicate precisely to that: to temporarily give up trees full of lights in exchange for a fee. The offer is wide and includes everything from small specimens to others of large size and size, for both indoor and outdoor spaces. But is it a business? Yes. The holidays may only last a few weeks, but if companies like Ximenezthe Córdoba company that has been in charge of setting up decorations in Vigo, Madrid, Barcelona or Milan, is that Christmas decorations can become a million dollar business. After all, it is not only families who demand decoration. Governments and companies of all kinds also do it, from businesses that do not have space to store decorations the rest of the year to hotels that need trees for their living rooms and hallways. In a warehouse in Madrid… One of the most popular Christmas tree rental companies in Spain is B&M, a family business with twenty years of experience that works from a warehouse in Tetuán, Madrid. Recently those responsible they explained to The Spanish Newspaper Every campaign, about 200 trees come out of there ready to decorate and that the company itself is in charge of collecting once the holidays are over. Their work involves several challenges, such as matching the taste of their clients and coordinating the logistics that require dismantling and removing 200 trees during the second week of January. “The pickup is intense because on the 9th everyone wants you to pick it up.” “Three, four hours at least”. The company also makes it clear that although it may seem like a simple task, preparing the ideal tree requires work. First they convey a proposal to the clients. Then they shape it. “A four or five meter tree is a job for five or six people, who have to spend at least three or four hours on it,” clarifies the signaturewhich explains, for example, that there are businesses that want trees with their corporate colors. How much do these services cost? In your website There are rates (with delivery and collection service included) ranging from 265 to 2,800 euros, without VAT. It all depends on the tree you want. They range from 1.5 to five meters. Are there more options? Yes. The demand for Christmas decoration is intense enough that it has encouraged other businesses, such as those that are committed to sustainability and offer a rent in pot. Your proposal? Instead of buying a plastic tree or taking a felled fir, rent one that you can place in your house alive, with its pot. Once in your living room you can decorate and take care of it and after Christmas the company will collect it to take it to a forest or to its nursery of origin. Images | Arun Kuchibhotla (Unsplash) and Jared Lind (Unsplash) In Xataka | Without knowing it, we all honor Thor during Christmas thanks to a pagan ritual: the Christmas tree

A British MP did not have permission to build a house in the countryside so he was left with only one option: dig it up

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Housing is one of the main problemsnot only because of the scarcity that makes its price skyrocketsbut because, even if you already have a plot on which to build the house of your dreams, urban planning and environmental legislation will not always allow you to build it. That is precisely what happened to British MP Bob Marshall-Andrews in the late 90s, when he wanted to build a house with sea views in Wales, but faced a huge dilemma. Environmental regulations did not allow him to erect any buildings since it was a natural space. There was only one way out so that your home was legal: dig it out. A house in a hole with sea views As and how did he count Wales Onlinelawyer and Labor Party MP Bob Marshall-Andrews and his wife Gill wanted to escape the bustle of the city and enjoy the leisurely pace of the waves crashing into St. Bride’s Bay on the Pembrokeshire cliffs in the far west of Wales. For years, he and his family had been spending vacations in an old military barracks. on Druidston Cliffuntil the structure began to deteriorate and the need to build something new became apparent. That’s where his problems began. The land of the MP and his wife Gill is located about 150 meters from the sea, in the heart of the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, a protected area since 1949 that covers more than 300 kilometers of coastline with cliffs, open beaches, sheltered bays, marshes and dunes. In this environment, the authorities have been traditionally very strict: the neighbors considered practically impossible to obtain permission even for small glazed extensions in existing houses. To comply with the regulations and still stay in that place, the only way was to literally hide the new house underground, excavating the land and taking advantage of the natural ridge of the cliff as part of the construction. The idea came from his son Tom, who thought it would be a good idea to integrate the house into the landscape by excavating it between two hills. The result was Malatora semi-buried house, almost invisible from afar, which today has become one of the most striking examples of architecture integrated into the landscape of the Welsh coast. So much so that it even has your own reference on Wikipedia. A crazy idea that ended in genius The British parliamentarian left the commission to the architects Jan Kaplicky and Amanda Levetefounders of the Future Systems studio, had a central premise: to obtain legalized housing that would not give arguments to those responsible for the park. to deny license. To avoid any feeling of privilege towards a parliamentarian, the project was planned from the beginning as a construction that would not compete with the landscape, but would hide in it and reduce its visible impact to a minimum, just as Tom, the son of the owners, had proposed. Thus, the architects chose build downexcavating the hill instead of raising a traditional construction, so that the house will be buried under a cover of earth and grass that continues the shape of the hill. This strategy is reminiscent of ancient techniques from northern Scandinavia, where layers of earth and grass were accumulated to form thick walls with good thermal inertia and great camouflage capacity in the terrain. The designers were inspired by the wing section of an airplane for its visible part. The façade facing the sea is resolved with a large glass plane and portholes, while the upper part and sides are buried and covered with grass and vegetation, so that from the park path the house is perceived as a simple mound covered with grass. This extreme integration with the landscape It was decisive for the local authorities to give their approval, since the construction does not break the undulating line of meadows and bushes nor does it introduce visible plot limits, fences or gardens separated from the rest of the park. Furthermore, technically, no construction had been “raised”. Inside, the curved floor plan is organized around a central fireplace, inspired by the great medieval halls. A large semicircular sofa and prefabricated walls that separate the rooms of the house without touching the ceiling, reinforcing the feeling of continuous space. Respect for the environment was taken to the extreme even during its construction, as many of the internal elements, including the bathrooms, were manufactured in workshops and brought in small pieces to the plot. A decision designed to reduce heavy truck traffic to a minimum on a narrow road adapted to the orography of the cliff. The house soon became popular in the area and, given its peculiar design, the locals have baptized it as “the Teletubbies house” due to its resemblance to the half-buried house from the children’s series, a nickname that its owner receives with humor. In Xataka | Of all the places there were to build a $400,000 house, this millionaire chose the most unusual: in a tree Image | Geograph.org (Cered, Deborah Tilley, Simon Mortimer, Michael Graham, Dave Challender)

For years, foreigners who wanted sun and beach bought a house in Spain. Now they are looking for something else: luxury housing

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The real estate market emits signals which show that foreigners have won a relevant weight in the sale and purchase of luxury homes, which leads us to think about changes in the profile of the international buyer. Spain is no longer just a destination for families or couples from other countries interested in getting a small apartment for their vacation in search of sun and beach. It also receives wealthy people who want settle herein the cities, and is able to pay for his house out of pocket. The data are certainly suggestive. “First level destination”. I warned him recently in an interview with Idealista Paloma Pérez Bravo, CEO of Residencial de Lucas Fox, a platform specialized in the premium market: “Spain has gone from being a sun and beach getaway to a top-level luxury destination.” From your experiencethe country “has stopped being the home of the sun and has become the home of investment. People want more first homes than second homes because they are moving to Spain.” It’s not the only change he appreciates. Upon your signature, Bravo explains to SERdigital nomads are now arriving, entrepreneurs from America, English and American, also businessmen and investors who used to invest in the US and now find themselves with problems there due to Trump’s immigration policy. Is there data? Yes, although they come mainly from companies, so they must be handled with some caution. In your report On market forecasts for 2026, Lucas Fox reveals for example that 62% of buyers Those who close transactions worth more than 2.5 million euros are foreigners, more than 60% of ultra-luxury sales are signed without the need for financing and a good part of the acquisitions are made in search of a “main residence”, not to convert the property into a vacation home or as an investment. Looking ahead to next year, the company also expects that activity in the segments prime and super prime grow 3-6% and 6-10% respectively and leaves behind a fundamental idea that tells us about the profile of those clients who purchase the most expensive houses: “The international buyer is already the majority.” Specifically, the weight of Europeans stands out, followed by Americans and British. Other percentage: 92%. Lucas Fox is not the first to warn of the frequency with which foreign accents are heard in real estate agencies specializing in the premium market. A few months ago Barnes claimed that 92% of buyers from the Spanish luxury market were already foreigners. Of them, around half (49%) were also investors from outside the EU, with a notable presence especially of Mexicans, Colombians, Venezuelans, Russians, Chinese and Arabs. The community members They accounted for 43% while the Spanish, according to the real estate agency, were left with a meager 8% of the total. Are there more clues? The answer is once again affirmative. Another company that shared data recently is LuxuryEstatea premium housing portal that confirms that searches by international buyers interested in the Spanish market already represent a substantial part of its traffic. Above all, the demand for information from european countries such as Germany, France, Italy, Belgium or the Netherlands and the interest aroused by the premium segment of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, Madrid or the Valencian Community. Other regions, such as the Canary Islands and the Basque Country, also seem to be emerging. A consolidated destination. LuxuryEstate confirm in fact that ours “is no longer just an aspirational destination, but a highly competitive market.” The comment is in line with what it points out to Lucas Fox or even CaixaBank Research, which in a recent analysis Regarding the changes in the profile of the resident foreigner who acquires housing in Spain, he warns: “Spain has established itself as one of the most attractive destinations for luxury investment in Europe.” Different buyers. In the same reportCaixaBank recalls that the demand for housing by foreigners has grown in recent years, first after the pandemic and then thanks to the improvement in financing. It also clarifies that there are differences between resident foreigners and those who do not live here and are mainly looking for houses for their vacations or as an investment. On average, the former (residents) paid around €1,795/m2 in 2024 and the latter (non-residents) €3,063/m2. These are values ​​significantly higher than those recorded by national buyers, which moved at 1,713. However, the last balance of Property Registrars shows that foreign demand for housing has reduced in the third quarter of the year, representing 13.6% of the total. The percentage reflects the entire market, not just the luxury segment, although there are those who warn that the latter is not immune to the shortage of supply, which among other issues affects its prices. Images | DaYsO (Unsplash) In Xataka | After Catalonia, there is another autonomous community considering prohibiting buying a home to invest: Canary Islands

If you buy a house there it is to live there

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The Canary Islands have an idea to alleviate their serious residential crisis and make it easier for people who live and work on the islands but are unable to find an affordable home: limit purchases of housing among non-residents. It is not a new proposal nor is it free of controversybut in recent days the island Government has managed to sneak it back into the center of the public debate. He has even achieved the direct backup of the Ministry of Housing. The big question, in view of the latest data of purchase and sale, it is… Will it really help the Canaries to opt for “decent homes”? What has happened? That the Canary Islands want to limit the purchase of housing among non-residents on the islands. It’s not a new idea and it’s not easy either put it into practicesince it would have to fit into the community legal framework, but in recent days the island Government has managed to sneak it into the center of the debate. First to raise that restriction publicly during a European summit. Second, by getting the Ministry of Housing support your position. What exactly has he done? To begin the Government of the Canary Islands has transferred to Brussels for its “concern” about the lack of a “courageous strategy” on crucial issues affecting the island territories, such as housing. This was stated last week by the vice-adviser of the President’s Cabinet, Octavio Caraballo, during the Conference of EU Peripheral and Maritime Regions held in Barcelona. In that forum, Canarias went further and put an idea on the table: protect those who buy houses to actually live in them. “The Canary Islands maintains its efforts to establish limits on the purchase of housing on the islands by non-residents to guarantee a decent home for the people who live in the archipelago,” explains the regional government, which reminded the conference that foreign purchases and vacation rental boom is “straining” the market and reducing the housing supply available to locals. “It compromises social sustainability.” Has it stayed there? No. His proposal has been in the news again this week because the Canary Islands Executive he put it on the table during the meeting held on Thursday with Minister Isabel Rodríguez to discuss the State Housing Plan. From that meeting the Canarian authorities left with the “express support” of the State to limit the purchase of housing by people outside the islands. “He has shown his support for the defense that we are carrying out before the EU to protect the right to housing of all Canary Islands and limit the purchase of housing by non-resident foreigners,” assures counselor Pablo Rodríguez. Without going into details, the ministry issued a statement after the meeting in which he confirmed that he is in favor of the EU allowing “speculative purchases” to be prohibited. Is it a new proposal? No. Just a year ago the Canarian Government already announced which was looking for a way to take advantage of the islands’ Outermost Region (ORP) status to restrict the weight of non-resident foreigners in its real estate market. The truth is that the idea it’s been a while installed in the public and political debate, where it has not reached the necessary consensus for get ahead. Nor is it an idea exclusive to the Canary Islands. In 2024 Add came to present a non-legal proposal for the Government to veto the acquisition of houses by investment funds and non-resident buyers in Spain for three years. It did not prosper, among other reasons due to the vote against the PSOE. The same idea has sounded in the Balearic Islands either Cataloniawhere the markets are also very marked by vacation rentals. Why this interest? In the words of the Canary Islands Government, to guarantee that those who live and work on the islands can reside there and are not “expelled” by rentals for tourists and a market in full escalation. According to Idealista, since 2020 rents have become more expensive than 50% and the price of residential m2 has risen 68.3%. Housing is so expensive that there are temporary workers who have no choice but to stay in caravans. The island government assures that in recent years “a third of sales in the Canary Islands have been carried out by non-resident foreigners”, which complicates accessibility to a residential market that already deals with a “limited supply and growing demand”. To solve this, the Executive proposes restricting purchases by foreigners who do not live in the region, a measure that has precedents in other countries but faces a challenge: the European lawthat explicitly protects the “free movement of capital.” Is housing that expensive? Yes. At least it’s expensive enough to be in production. a curious phenomenon: foreigners themselves are being expelled from the market. a report published in October by the General Council of Notaries shows that, while in communities such as Asturias, Castilla y León or Galicia, home purchase and sale operations grew during the first half of the year, in tourist-rich markets such as the Canary Islands they have declined. In the Balearic Islands they ‘punctured’ by 6.8%, in Navarra by 3.7%, in the Valencian Community by 3.6% and in the Canary Islands by 7.7%, a decline that comes in the midst of a rise in prices. Images | Reiseuhu (Unsplash) and Bastian Pudill (Unsplash) In Xataka | There are those who think that the housing crisis can be solved by building. At the Polytechnic University of Catalonia they believe they are wrong

change house doors

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Changing the doors of the house, a seemingly minor and routine renovation, has become one of the most expensive household items in recent years. To the point that many carpenters are already talking about a “new era of prices” in the sector. As a professional said interviewed by El Español: “Before I charged 120 euros per unit; now they go over 250 without a problem.” And it is not an isolated case: specialized platforms confirm that renewing a single interior door can today cost between 150 and 600 euros. This price increase responds to a combination of factors that has strained the entire production chain. A climb from the forest to the factory. Wood, the base of most interior doors, is primarily responsible. As Maderea explainsa reference platform in the sector, species such as radiata pine or oak have recorded increases of up to 20% in Spain. This variation is not punctual: the market is experiencing a period of volatility marked by international demand, the supply crisis, energy costs and the rise of the bioeconomy. The Basoa reports show high values in the radiata pine in all its categories. Although they are prices at origin, they serve as a thermometer: the cost of raw materials continues to be stressed, with no signs of falling. However, not only does the tree go up: everything around it also goes up, from electricity necessary for manufacturing to transportation. A minor reform that is no longer cheap. The result of these increases is evident for the consumer: changing a door no longer costs what it used to. According to Habitissimothe average price of replacing an interior door is around 350 euros, within a range that can go from 150 to 600 euros depending on the material, type of opening or complexity. The Idealista platform offers similar figures In terms of prices, MDF and solid wood are the cheapest, reaching €600. For its part, the Cronoshare portal raises the national average at 300 and 900 euros, depending on the type of door and installation. On the other hand, if we talk about an exterior door, the figure multiplies. Both Idealista and Habitissimo point out that an armored door usually costs between 600 and 1,500 euros; an armored one can go up to 4,800 euros, and those made of aluminum or PVC range between 200 and 900 euros. That’s not all. Added to the increase in materials is that of professionals. According to Idealistaa carpenter can charge between 25 and 50 euros per hour, and removing an old door plus installing the new one can cost between 200 and 300 euros. For its part, from Habitissimo agrees that The installation adds between 60 and 140 euros per unit. The professionals themselves say it clearly. The carpenter interviewed by El Español He explained that today they do not only charge for assembly: “The client believes that it is ‘just hanging a door’, but behind it there are expensive materials, transportation, higher quality hardware and much finer work than before.” In addition, interior design trends—such as lacquered, sliding, large-format or flush doors—also raise the final price. And what will happen from now on? For now, no indicators suggest that prices will decline. According to Madereathe wood market continues to be highly volatile, driven by energy and logistics costs that are pushing upwards. The Basoa reportsfor their part, show high rates and no significant declines in the price of standing timber during 2025. Neither do the reform platforms they foresee reductions in material or labor costs. The conclusion is clear: unless an unexpected economic turn occurs, changing the doors in your home will continue to be an expensive renovation for years to come. Is there a cheaper way to change my doors? What all the consulted guides do agree on is a series of recommendations to contain spending. On the one hand, request several quotes to compare prices and avoid excessive differences between professionals. Also can be useful Take advantage of seasonal offers, such as Black Friday campaigns or sales of discontinued models, where some stores apply relevant discounts. Another strategy for those who want to renovate without completely replacing is to restore or lacquer the existing doors. And it suits avoid special measuressince ordering doors outside of standard sizes can multiply the final cost. We’ll have to think twice. What was once an affordable domestic intervention—changing an interior door for just over a hundred euros—has become a renovation that can easily exceed 300, 400 or even 600 euros per unit, depending on the material and installation. The rise in the price of wood, the impact of energy on manufacturing, logistics and the growing demand for higher quality designs have pushed this item to unprecedented levels. Image | Unsplash and Pexels Xataka | Even when Spain does it well, it goes wrong: becoming the third most forested country in Europe has become a problem

If you bought your house before 2013 and paid off the mortgage with its sale: The Treasury owes you money

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If you bought your house before 2013 we have good news for you: now you will be able to recover up to 1,356 euros on your tax return thanks to an important change in the way in which the Treasury recognizes mortgage deductions. If you used the money from the sale of your home to pay what you mortgage pendingthis change in Treasury doctrine can directly affect you. The new resolution of the Central Economic-Administrative Court (TEAC) opens the door for thousands of taxpayers to review their statements from recent years and request returns that they couldn’t ask for before. An opportunity to save on rent. The Central Economic-Administrative Court (TEAC) has dictated a change of doctrine in a resolution in which he has clarified that, if you use part of the money from the sale of your house to pay off the remaining mortgage, you can also deduct that amount on your income tax return. This changes the way the Treasury saw things until now and may mean recover more money on your taxes. Previously, you could only deduct mortgage payments while you lived in the house and owned it. If you sold the home, you lost the deduction from the day of the sale, even if you used part of the money to pay off the mortgage. An example to understand it easily. The TEAC resolution has been based on the binding consultation of a taxpayer from Santa Cruz de Tenerife, so his case can serve as a practical example. This taxpayer sold his home in June 2018 and used 10,202 euros of the amount obtained from the sale to pay off the mortgage. At that time, the Treasury only allowed him to deduct the installments paid until May, the month before the sale of the home, because the cancellation payment for the same, although it is part of the investment in that home, was no longer counted because it was no longer his property. With the new TEAC criteria, this cancellation with the money from the sale can also be deducted and therefore the excess withholding in personal income tax that was not previously recognized can be recovered. This represents a real change for those who have sold their house and paid off their debt with the money from the sale, since their right to the deduction does not disappear the day they sell the house, but remains in force as long as they use that money to pay the cancellation of their mortgage. Conditions to access the deduction. As and as they remember in IberleyIn order to benefit from this deduction, a series of conditions must be met. The first condition is that the home had to be your habitual residence until the moment of selling it. The second condition is to have purchased that home before 2013 and to have applied the personal income tax deduction prior to its sale. The maximum base for calculating the deduction is 9,040 euros per year, and the Treasury allows you to deduct 15% of what you pay for the loan. That leaves a maximum deduction of 1,356 euros per year which, if you had not applied it after the sale of the home, you can now claim if applicable. Review of declarations from 2021. From Idealistic stand out that, although this deduction is only for those who bought before 2013, those taxpayers who have sold their home and canceled the mortgage since 2021 can review their returns to see if the personal income tax deduction was correctly applied, including that final cancellation amount. This means that there may be pending returns for those who did not claim it at the time and meet the requirements in the years between 2021 and 2024, as long as their term has not expired. In Xataka | Just in case Madrid had few problems with housing, now it adds one more: US millionaires investing in the city Image | Wikimedia Commons (Jordiferrer, Ruth Leong)

House renovations used to be to make them more habitable. Now they can also be converted into Lego sets

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At the beginning of October we count that the lack of space in modern homes or the impossibility of collecting quantities of LEGO due to how much they occupy had led to the creation of a business especially aimed at those who do not want to give up building new sets, but do not need to keep them. Brick Borrow rent LEGO sets…which are then returned. It happens that more and more people are directly renovating their house to make room for it. to these jewels. Domestic brick utopias. I was telling it on the weekend the wall street journal. In recent years, the rise of adult collecting Lego has transformed entire domestic spaces into carefully designed and detailed miniature worlds, urban landscapes, beaches with bathers and functional amusement parks. Of all, the case by Christie Northin Salt Lake City, is especially representative: he has torn down walls, renovated his basement and spent more than $100,000 in building and displaying his Lego city, which he accesses through a fingerprint scanner and which he is considering monitoring with cameras to observe when he travels. The origin. The woman started as a hobby to combat boredom during the pandemic, but became your emotional refugea task where methodical construction and imagination combine into something he describes as “feeding the soul.” In his brick world you can see a mix of technical dedication, nostalgia and the search for a personal space in the face of everyday routines. Adult collecting. The truth is that Lego has been able to cultivate, especially since 2020, a growing base adult amateurmany of whom could not afford the most ambitious sets during their childhood, but today they have income and a sentimental motivation to rebuild what they before it was inaccessible. The problem is not only economic, but also spatial: the largest sets can occupy entire tables or even entire rooms, forcing coexistence decisions, as in the case by Steve Isomwhich has assembled more than 275 sets and has given its dining room, office and shelves to spaceships suspended from the ceiling and monumental models like a titanic shelf or an Eiffel Tower almost meter and a half. His wife tolerates the hobby, but imposes clear limits: The bedroom is left out of the invasion of bricks. This negotiation silent It is repeated in many homes, where the passion for building clashes with shared aesthetics, functionality and the simple space available. Architecture, interior design and adaptation. The transformation of the home into a gallery of Lego pieces has even given rise to a specific demand in interior architecture. He architect Jeff Pelletierhimself a fan, claims to have designed more than twenty houses with rooms dedicated to Lego, mostly for adults. His advice includes Avoid rooms with direct light to avoid discoloring the pieces and use closed display cases to reduce dust. In other cases, it suggests integrate small Lego pieces as discreet decorative accents on shelves, walls or artistic compositions that imitate famous works. These solutions seek balance passion and aestheticspreserving the visual identity of the home without eliminating the collector’s creative space. Even in the real estate market, agents like Niko Cejic they claim that houses with Lego rooms can be more attractive, providing character and differentiation compared to the neutral standardization of so many contemporary interiors. The home as an emotional refuge. Beyond the hobby, these Lego rooms reflect an emotional need profound in a context of increasingly fast-paced lives, demanding jobs and changing family structures. Evan Rubinfor example, finds in his Lego room an oasis of manual repetition and visual calm, a selective return to a childhood reinterpreted. Many homeowners describe these constructions as a way to regain creativity in the face of monotonous routines, and also as a way to build an identity within the home. They told in the Journal that the replacement of more traditional life projects (such as raising children in increasingly smaller and late-term homes) is intertwined with this phenomenon: pets, plants and Lego appear where cribs once appeared. The house is no longer just a place to live, but a stage in which to reconstruct an intimate version of oneself. Tiny “real” worlds. Ultimately, the lego roomshidden in basements, domestic extensions or carefully reserved rooms, aim to be one (another) cultural manifestation of a contemporary desire for belonging, refuge and creative control. If you will, they also represent a silent, patient and manual response to digital speed, constant productivity and the pressure of adulthood. The worlds built with bricks They do not replace the outside world, of course, but they offer continuity between the child who played and the adult who seeks his own space in the midst of obligations, schedules and demands. Ultimately, in those miniature cities There is a simple and universal statement: although life pushes us to grow, there will always be parts of us that need to continue building. Image | Brickset, PXHere In Xataka | The secret to continuing to accumulate LEGO sets is not to keep them. This rental service helps you with that. In Xataka | One thousand euros for the Star Wars Death Star: the most expensive Lego set to date does not make all fans happy

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