Spain unveils public investment fund to tackle housing crisis

Madrid: Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Monday presented a new public investment fund that he said would raise 120 billion euros ($142 billion...

Madrid: Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Monday presented a new public investment fund that he said would raise 120 billion euros ($142 billion) and help tackle the country's persistent housing crisis.

Scarce and unaffordable housing is consistently a top concern for Spaniards and represents a stubborn challenge in one of the world's most dynamic developed economies.

The new "Spain Grows" fund, first announced in January, aims to replace the tens of billions of EU post-Covid recovery aid that helped drive Spain's strong growth in recent years.

Sanchez said the headline figure -- representing seven percent of Spain's annual economic output -- would come through public and private sources, with an initial contribution of 10.5 billion euros of EU money.

The fund would "mobilise up to 23 billion euros in public and private funding to dynamise the housing supply" and help build 15,000 homes per year, Sanchez added, without specifying a timeframe for the planned investment.