We inaugurate Clau Mestra, a project that serves as an example of public-cooperative collaboration to give rise to solutions to the housing crisis

The rehabilitation of the old 'Cases dels Mestres' materialized nine years after the first claims, and was largely self-constructed by the neighbors themselves.

Sostre Cívic, with the Sant Cugat del Vallès City Council, we handed over the keys today to vtools of the 11 homes of the old Houses of the Masters of La Floresta, rehabilitated after just over a year of work on the first cooperative housing project in Sant Cugat del Vallès. 

The act of handing over the keys is the final materialization of an innovative agreement between social agents and local administration that has made possible 11 cooperative homes of between 60 and 38 m², plus a collective space, under the sheltered housing regime (HPO) at an affordable price: the monthly fees are between €300 and €500, and the partners to move in have had to make a capital contribution (returnable if they decide to leave the project) between €6.000 and €9.000, depending on the area of ​​the property housing 

A pioneering solution through public cooperation

The project, called Clau Mestra, is an example of how cooperation between the public administration and civil society can lead to affordable and sustainable housing projects, in a context of housing and social crisis such as that experienced by Catalonia and, especially, Sant Cugat del Vallès .

In 2014, faced with the general state of deterioration that the Casas dels Mestres property presented, they were occupied as a political pressure action to force the City Council to use the building as social housing. A negotiation process, with Sostre Cívic as a mediating agent between the group and the City Council, it led to the signing of an agreement between the parties to promote HPO housing under a right of use regime. It was, then, the first agreement in the Spanish state with a public administration to promote cooperative housing in right of use. 

But it wasn't until 2020 that the City Council overcomes all the bureaucratic hurdles and signs the surface right of the municipal building to the cooperative Sostre Cívic to be able to start the rehabilitation works, in addition to a returnable subsidy (once the mortgage loan is finished) of €301.395,85, incorporated in the agreement signed between both agents in 2018. Francis Duch, deputy mayor of Urban Development and Housing, has assured that "Today, a neighborhood wish that began a long time ago is being fulfilled: the first cooperative housing development in the municipality is becoming a reality, a model that we strongly believe in and that we want to develop."

The affordability of the project has been made possible thanks to a mortgage loan from theCatalan Institute of Finance of 1,1 million euros, with advantageous conditions within the policy of support for sheltered housing of this public financial body of the Generalitat. Your business manager, Antoni Valles, also participated in the event today in La Floresta and stated that "when a project is studied, sometimes we forget what the result is: seeing and touching what has been done thanks to the funding granted is especially exciting".

The Generalitat has also supported the project through the Catalan Housing Agency. the deputy director ofSocial and Solidarity Economy and the Cooperatives of the Generalitat, Roser Hernandez, present today at the beginning of the coexistence of Clau Mestra has remarked that "if we apply the values ​​of the social and solidarity economy to housing, reality can be transformed. This type of housing creates a community, but also a social market. It is a powerful form of economic reactivation of the sector".

A community and sustainable rehabilitation

The design of the new homes is of Zaga architecture i Som Hàbitat, and the works have been carried out by La Constructiva SCCL: the first cooperative and non-profit construction manager in the country, the que has already built cooperative buildings like La Balma i Cirerers in Barcelona. The comprehensive rehabilitation of the property and its extension has allowed access to all the homes and increased the living area. Bio-construction systems and materials, such as wood, as well as highly efficient passive and active installations were used during the works. The end result is a building that serves as an example to demonstrate that a construction system allows for more sustainable consumption than conventional methods. 

In addition, the group of partners and from today neighbors of Clau Mestra participated in some of the rehabilitation tasks in the form ofassisted self-construction. This innovative model in the construction of cooperative housing pursues the dual objective of reducing costs but also serving as a powerful tool for empowering the group of cohabitants.

Eva Ortigosa, member of the Governing Council of Sostre Cívic celebrated today during the event that the project can finally be inaugurated after so many years of work and waiting. A project that has finally landed in Sant Cugat cooperative housing in right of use as "an alternative access to housing to buying and renting, which fights against real estate speculation, guaranteeing collective ownership and with democratic management".