Home Dispossession and Commercial Real Estate Dispossession in Tourist Conurbations. Analyzing the Reconfiguration of Displacement Dynamics in Los Cristianos/Las Américas (Tenerife)

Since the onset of the global financial crisis, urban dwellers face an increasing number of obstacles in establishing themselves on the housing market. Against this backdrop, this paper addresses the variegated dynamics of real estate dispossession in the tourist conurbation Los Cristianos/Las Américas on an intra-urban scale. First, I will present the spatio-temporal patterns of dispossession for the period 2001–2015 using the ATLANTE database (CGPJ). Specifically, I analyze mortgage foreclosures and tenant evictions, both for residential and commercial spaces. Second, I delve deeper into local experiences of dispossession of the resident population and their housing and income conditions by means of questionnaires that I conducted in 2018. The data shows that mortgage foreclosures and dispossessions of residential spaces predominate the initial years after the crisis, albeit with varied spatial incidence. However, the increase in tenant evictions from 2014 onwards points to a reconfiguration of displacement dynamics. Indeed, as stated by the interviewees, staggeringly high rent burdens have become the main driver for displacement from both living and working spaces in recent years. Given the ongoing global pandemic, further and more nuanced research is necessary to grasp how these prevailing housing insecurities are shaped during and beyond the coronavirus crisis.

A gender approach to housing loss in Spain: the case of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria

In pre-pandemic times, Spain was one of the European countries where the economic crisis hit the real estate market hardest, leading to rising mortgage foreclosures and eviction of tenants, as highlighted by many scholars on the financial geography of housing. Its matched social effects reveal the outstanding role of gender, foreign status, and income levels, starting from the hypothesis that the intersection among these categories shows the dimension of inequality in the neoliberal configuration of cities. The aim of this article is to provide this evidence through the study case of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, using a GIS to implement statistical correlations of these categories on a microurban scale. The created database rests on information contained in judicial archives (women’s foreclosures and evictions) and on ethnicity and income level statistical information. This allows us to go deeper into the factors of exposure to vulnerability, in accordance with an established academic tradition regarding gender, housing and the city.

Mortgage Foreclosures and Older Americans

Economic conditions improved since the 2008–09 mortgage market crisis, and home prices recovered in many areas. Nevertheless, over time, growing numbers of older households have taken on greater mortgage debt than in the past. These families are also carrying mortgage loans into retirement, far more than they did in the past. Foreclosure rates for all loans have decreased to pre-recession levels for borrowers under age 50, while for borrowers age 50+, foreclosure rates in 2017 were higher than in 2007. This means that many older homeowners may face the loss of their homes, despite the fact that the economy improved after the financial crisis.

The Role of the Legal Services Corporation in Improving Access to Justice

The Legal Services Corporation is the United States' largest funder of civil legal aid for low-income Americans. The LSC funds legal-aid programs that serve households with annual incomes at or below 125 percent of the federal poverty guideline. Legal-aid clients face a wide variety of civil legal problems: wrongful evictions, mortgage foreclosures, domestic violence, wage theft, child custody and child support issues, and denial of essential benefits. This vital work is badly underfunded. The shortfall between the civil legal needs of low-income Americans and the resources available to address those needs is daunting. Federal funding is necessary because support for civil legal aid varies widely from state to state. The LSC uses the “justice gap” metaphor to describe the shortfall between legal needs and legal services. Narrowing the gap is central to the LSC's mission.

Extracting rents through foreclosures: The rescue of Catalunya Banc as a new urban strategy following the burst of the Spanish bubble

Using the paradigmatic example of Catalunya Banc, this paper analyses the Spanish varieties of the new financial engineering used to appropriate urban rent by home dispossession. It aims to contribute to the study of the new forms of financialization that have appeared since 2008. Particular attention is given to the role of the state, the emergence of private equity funds as global real estate owners and how this has translated into a wave of evictions due to mortgage foreclosures. In short, this article highlights the implications of the uneven development resulting from the exhaustion of the so-called Spanish model of accumulation during the real estate boom years.