The Housing Plunder: It Seems They Want Us Without Property and Dependent on the State

This is not a calculation error. It is not inefficient management. It is a system designed to ensure that becoming a homeowner is never simple.

A few days ago, my blog published a study, and today I am reading a publication in the newspaper Expansión echoing a study by economist Jaume Menéndez Fernández that presents a chilling figure: housing bears a tax burden exceeding 62% of its value throughout its lifecycle. In other words, when you buy a house, more than half of what you pay—and what you will work to pay off—is seized by the state machinery before, during, and after the transaction.

A Legacy Shared by All Governments

Many point fingers at the current administration, but let us be honest and critical: this is not a matter of political acronyms, but of the political class. Since the Transition to the present day, various governments of all leanings have maintained and perfected this system of constant “tolls” on the roof over our heads. Decades have passed, and regardless of who sits in the council of ministers, the goal remains the same: to collect revenue at the expense of a constitutional right.

It appears the real political consensus is that citizens should have no savings, no assets, and die without leaving a burden-free inheritance. They want us begging the State for solutions instead of being masters of our own autonomy.

Eternal “Rent” to the State

As tax experts, we analyze the numbers and the conclusion is clear: housing is the Treasury’s favorite loot. Taxes are levied on development, on acquisition (VAT/Property Transfer Tax), on ownership (Property Tax/Wealth Tax), and on transfer (Capital Gains/Inheritance Tax).

If we want to restore freedom to the citizen, tax reform must not be cosmetic; it must be radical:

• ZERO VAT and Property Transfer Tax for primary residences: It is an obscenity that a family must pay a “revolutionary tax” simply for buying the roof under which they will live. This is not a speculative investment; it is a life project.

• Elimination of “ownership” taxes: Wealth Tax is nothing more than a punishment for savings and previous effort. If you already paid taxes to earn the money and paid taxes to buy the house, why must you pay a yearly “rent” for something that is already yours?

• End the tax on inflation: Personal Income Tax (IRPF) taxes capital gains that do not exist. If you sell a house today for more than you paid 20 years ago just to compensate for the cost of living, you are not wealthier; the money is simply worth less. Taxing this is confiscatory and contradicts Article 31.1 of the Spanish Constitution.

• Mobility without punishment: Taxing the exchange or change of a primary residence hinders labor mobility and family growth. It is a state-imposed barrier to freedom of movement.

Neutrality or Social Control?

Modern taxation should be simple and neutral. Yet ours is complex and voracious. When the State claims 62% of a basic good’s value, it sends a clear message: it does not belong to you; it belongs to us.

Housing policy cannot be fixed with more interventionism or laws that attack private property. It is fixed by ceasing to suffocate those who wish to own their lives. We do not want a State that “gives” us a housing solution; we want a State that stops stripping us of our ability to pay for our own.

Are politicians—all of them—willing to renounce their loot so that citizens can become owners again? The response, so far, has been a resounding silence.