Well, yes, today we have a lot to celebrate... we are already more than 1000 members a Sostre Cívic! 

1000 people who promote stable and affordable housing outside the private property model. That we work to make possible a way of living that is more communal and based on human bonds and mutual support. That we grow and learn day by day thanks to the assemblies, debates and meetings we hold to rethink where we want to go and how we want to do it. 

The road to this point has been intense and very enriching, and that is why we now want to take advantage of this milestone to take a short break and look back, an exercise that could not be complete without the participation of the members of Sostre Cívic, who have been the engine to make everything possible. Will you accompany us on this walk through the history of our organization?

2004 | is born Sostre Cívic: we believe in another way of living!

Sostre Cívic was created as an association in 2004 with the aim of spreading a new model of housing in Catalonia: cooperative housing in right of use. Taking as a reference the Scandinavian countries and the Andel model, it was about the first entity in the territory which was created for this purpose. 

As a pioneer within the sector, the road to travel by disseminating and explaining how the right of use works was long and stimulating. But we soon gained strength and, six years later, we promoted the birth of the cooperative, to be able to carry out the first projects under this model, and begin to realize an alternative that until then only seemed possible many kilometers from distance

2014 | Princesa49, the first cooperative housing project of Sostre Cívic

In 2014, the opportunity to collaborate with Barcelona City Council is being considered to conduct a pilot test in the city with a housing cooperative project in right of use in a disused building in the La Ribera neighborhood. The City Council ceded the use of the building to Sostre Cívic through a 75-year surface right, in exchange for a comprehensive rehabilitation that would allow for better accessibility, energy savings and that would become a model both for the sector and for the people who would live there.

Four years later, in June 2018, the residents moved in after a participatory and collective decision-making process and a year of construction. This is how he was born our first project: Princesa49, which would also be the first cooperative housing in right of use on public property in all of Catalonia Chus Left, one of the neighbors of the project and partner nº 93, explains why she opted for this alternative model to ownership and renting:

"I didn't want to own properties because I felt like a free spirit, I believed that the more properties, the more ties. And renting was not an answer for me either: I was living in a very large flat in the Eixample and I had to rent rooms because the price was going up and it was too much for me. The right of use is a safer option than renting, because sometimes they charge you so much that you then have to leave, as happened to me.”

Chus Ezquerra, member of the project Princesa49

2016 | La Balma i Cirerers, winners of two of the plots in the first competition in Barcelona

At the end of 2016, the Barcelona City Council put seven municipal lots up for public tender to promote cooperative housing, and Sostre Cívic we are awarded two of them: they are the lots in the Roquetes and Poblenou neighborhoods, which will become the projects of La Balma i Cirerers.

These are our first two new construction projects, and they are the two most large-scale (20 and 32 homes, respectively). This opportunity marks a before and after on our path, demonstrating that it is also possible to create social and sustainable housing from the third sector, and thanks to it we are growing in the number of members and in visibility, increasing our social base by more than double three years: we went from 446 members in 2016 to 915 in 2019.

Seeing that the social economy is capable of erecting buildings, dares, innovates and does it horizontally is a leap forward in the personal feeling that we can do it all. And I also take with me moments of shared suffering, which is always minor, but which is important to bear in mind that it is also part of life.

Carlos Alcoba, expectant partner, nº 357, and current president of Sostre Cívic

2019 | Cooperative housing is expanding

2019 is a fundamental year for the expansion of cooperative housing and the establishment of its foundations. February is born cooperative housing sector of the XES with the aim of strengthening the model and encouraging the promotion of public policies. And also we work the guides "We build cooperative housing" and the observatory Llargavista to generate knowledge and promote the dissemination in Catalonia of cooperative housing in right of use in its different dimensions.

In addition, through the right of trial and withdrawal we start promoting new housing projects in buildings already built. This way allows us both to activate assets for cooperative housing projects and to increase the stock of social housing in a much shorter time than with new construction projects. This is how we can almost double our projects in a short time, reaching 15 by the end of 2020, which will mean more than 200 homes over the next few years.  

In addition, we continue to work in other ways, collaborating with administrations for the transfer of public land or the purchase of private property. For example, Can 70, which has been working since 2015 to promote a senior project in the city of Barcelona, ​​in 2021 finally he got his lot.   

En Sostre Cívic I have found like-minded people to work for co-housing for the elderly, for a dignified and active ageing, where we can decide how we want to live, how we want to take care of ourselves, how we want to be taken care of and how we take care of who will take care of us. These 6 years have been enriching Can 70: for everything I've learned, for the people I've met, for all the work that has been done and continues to be done... they have been the best gift.

Maria Marrugat, 425 member and member of the project Can 70

And you... you also want to be part of our history?