HOUSING EMERGENCY: ALARMING NUMBERS IN VERONA
VERONA – Bishop Monsignor Domenico Pompili during solemn Vespers in the Basilica of San Zeno turned the spotlight back on the housing emergency in Verona. The problem of finding rental accommodation affects students and off-site workers, but also low-income elderly people and foreign workers. In the city of Verona the demand for houses for rent increased by 28%, on the other hand the supply decreased by 8%, which caused prices to rise, rising by an average of 7%.
But applications for public housing have also increased. In the latest call, 1500 arrived, triple compared to three years ago.
Eviction procedures have also increased in recent times which concern not only defaulting tenants who do not respect the contract, but also those who are up to date with their payments and who receive notice of termination upon expiry of the rental contract. In fact, there is also an increase in the number of owners who, once they have regained possession of the accommodation, convert the contract into short-term rentals for tourist use, which guarantees greater earnings and less risk of falling into defaulting tenants.
The solution could be to stem the tendency to switch housing from residential to tourist use, or to intervene on unused real estate.
