Catalunya extends the age limit from 35 to 40 years to access the public loan program of up to 50,000 euros to finance the down payment of a home for young people. This was announced by the president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, at an event in Barcelona this Friday. The change, effective since June 1, highlights the difficulty young people face in accessing the real estate market, which increasingly forces them to postpone the purchase of their first home. “We want to reach people who have a life project ahead, who have not had time to save,” Illa stated.
The Prèstecs Emancipació program was launched in 2025 by the Institut Català de Finances (ICF) and the Agència de l’Habitatge de Catalunya. Another novelty is that from now on it will be possible to finance the purchase of a parking space or storage room in the building where the home is located, and the home will not need to have the definitive cadastral reference at the time of signing.
Parking spaces and storage rooms enter the program
“It is a very innovative project that has been a good bet, we are very satisfied,” said Alícia Romero, Minister of Economy and Finance, at an event in Barcelona this Friday. “We have to support many young people who have difficulties obtaining housing,” she added. “In Spain, we are the ones who do the most in housing,” Illa said about the Generalitat’s housing policies.
In addition to the age requirement (being between 18 and 40 years old), the applicant must be registered in Catalunya and the home must become their habitual residence. They must also have an income below 83,392.53 euros if the home is for one person or 85,971.60 euros for two. The home can be new or used, must be in Catalunya, and cannot have been previously officially protected or be in the project or construction phase.
At most, 50,000 euros can be requested interest-free, with a grace period of up to 30 years before repayment. It is intended to cover the down payment for the first home, which is identified as “one of the main obstacles young people face when acquiring their first home.” The amount serves to finance the 20% of the down payment that entities usually do not provide. In this way, with the remaining 80% financed with a mortgage, it is possible to access homes up to 250,000 euros.
The program has an annual allocation of 100 million euros. Homes purchased with these funds acquire the status of officially protected housing, so they have a permanently limited price and certain requirements must be met in case of rental or sale. “We need to increase the housing supply, not only free market but also protected housing for the most vulnerable people,” Illa argued.
In eleven months of the program, so far the purchase of 1,158 homes has been facilitated, with an average loan of 36,342 euros granted to an average age profile of 29.6 years. The home purchased is around 190,000 euros. With the number of operations and the average loan, the ICF would reach financing of 42 million euros this first year, far from the 100 million cap of the allocation.
Just over half of the operations take place in the Barcelona region (647). The Comarques Gironines follows with 124 operations and almost 11% of the total, while Penedès completes the podium with 109 signed operations and 9.4%.
Among the entities participating in the program are CaixaBank, Sabadell, Bankinter, or Santander, as well as smaller ones like Arquia, Caixa Enginyers, or CaixaGuissona, among others.
