Liberal Initiative Proposes 24 Housing Measures, Including 6% VAT
IL leader Mariana Leitão wants 6% VAT on all housing construction and IRS-free rents for owners of empty homes. Here are the main proposals.
The leader of Iniciativa Liberal (IL, Portugal’s Liberal Initiative party), Mariana Leitão, on Friday presented 24 housing measures that the party said it would put to the Government the same day. The package aims to create what she called a “shock in supply” by making it faster, simpler and cheaper to build, by bringing empty properties back into use and by putting more homes on the rental market.
The proposals include charging IVA (Portugal’s value-added tax) at 6% on all construction for housing and exempting landlords from IRS (Portugal’s personal income tax) when they rent out homes that are currently closed. For tenants, IL wants an insurance product that would act as a bank guarantee, so people looking to rent would not have to pay several months of rent up front.
What IL is proposing
Leitão spoke in Malveira, in the municipality of Mafra in the Lisbon district, standing next to a house under construction. According to Observador, ECO and RTP, the measures she listed include:
- a national licensing portal for building permits
- the same building rules across the whole country
- more rural land (solo rústico) made available for building in urban areas
- IVA at 6% on all construction for housing
- no tax on homes passed on as gifts during the owner’s lifetime or as inheritances
- no tax on the sale of land for housing
- an IRS exemption for landlords who put closed homes up for rent
- an insurance scheme that works as a bank guarantee for tenants, replacing large upfront rent payments
She grouped the 24 measures into three areas: building, releasing properties that sit empty, and getting more homes onto the rental market. She said the three need to be worked on together. The full list of 24 was not detailed in the reports.
Leitão’s case on prices and population
Leitão argued that home building in Portugal slowed after 2005 while the population grew by more than one million people. “More population, fewer houses, prices going up,” she said, according to the reports. She said house values had risen 66% and rents 36%, which she described as almost double the European average. The reports did not say which period or which data those figures cover.
She pointed back to the 80s, when Portugal went through a housing crisis and answered it by building more homes. “We did it once, we can do it again,” she said.
Why it matters for renters and buyers
If the Government adopted them, several of the measures would touch people directly. Tenants who struggle to raise several months of rent in advance would be covered by the guarantee insurance. Landlords with empty homes would pay no IRS on the rent, and families passing on property would be spared tax on gifts and inheritances. Developers would pay 6% IVA on housing construction across the board.
These are proposals from an opposition party. IL presented them to the Government, which has made no public decision on them according to the reports.
A political fight over housing deals
The announcement came a day after the prime minister met the PS (Socialist Party) and Chega, the two largest opposition parties, on Thursday. Leitão accused the governing party and those two parties of blocking the country by failing to reach agreement on housing, and said they act out of political tactics instead of looking for solutions. She said the outcome of Thursday’s meetings did not surprise her.
She also said the President of the Republic’s call for agreements on housing had been important. The reports did not say when the Government would respond to the IL package.
Sources: Observador, ECO, RTP Notícias
