From ‘Enea’ to ‘Luxury’

Gustavo Antépa has continued to deepen the tourist housing business despite the fact that the City Hall initially opposed its interests.

In September last year he made significant changes to the company: on the one hand, he changed his name Grupo Editorial y Comunicación Enea to Luxury Rental Apartments and, on the other, he changed his social object: “Hospitality activities, tourism services and, in particular, the exploitation of holiday homes and/or apartments and ancillary activities”. The only administrator remained the same: Gustavo Antépara Benito.

What is more: On the Luxury website, in addition to the homes we have rented so far, there are at least two more, in the streets Zapatagile and Hedagile. The web does not specify on which portals these dwellings are located and the links are not active. Perhaps because there has been no possibility of discharge in the register, as in February 2020 the City Council agreed to suspend the licenses and procedures until the final approval of the new regulations for tourist homes. On his website, no, but on another, at least, he has offered an unregistered apartment, as in the aforementioned Gites. Until recently, the website offered three apartments of the same portal on Cutlery Street. Also with Arabatur’s “seal” of recommendation. We cannot ensure that Luxury does not offer more housing anywhere else, nor that the company or Antépa do not have more property. On the one hand, the data of Vitoria-Gasteiz are divided into different property records, and for this report we have limited ourselves to searching for the data in the registry that houses the Casco Viejo. On the other hand, although this is usually the case, it is not mandatory to register in the Property Registry.

Private Companies and Public Entities

In recent years, Luxury Rental Apartments has accumulated homes in the Casco Viejo for tourism, and Arabatur has tried to adapt the regulations of tourist housing to facilitate the turistification.

In the same years, Antépara has been a pp councillor at the City Hall of Vitoria-Gasteiz between 2016 and 2019 (in the 2019 elections he was on the party list but was not elected). And, above all, it is, together with Miguel Garnica, one of the two representatives of pp in public society Ensanche 21, who directs the urban policy of Vitoria-Gasteiz since 2015. Ensanche 21 decides, among other things, on the policy of land, housing and housing rehabilitation in Vitoria-Gasteiz and the Casco Viejo. Even more so. The Directorate of Urban Management of the City Council proposed to partially estimate Arabatur’s claim based on the favourable opinion of the society: “As for Arabatur’s claim, it contrasts with the municipal urban society [Ensanche 21] (...) and the possibility of authorizing tourist housing in whole buildings is considered sufficiently founded and acceptable.”

Here is a timeline that summarizes the main events and steps related to tourist housing and its developers.

Insufficient and distorted information

Antépa and Perosanz defend their interests. But for this purpose they have been presented as representatives of owners of “one or two floors”, when the Antepara has at least nine properties owned. As if that were not enough, Antépara 21 is a member of the board of directors of the Ensanche as representative of pp in the Basque Parliament. This position is especially noteworthy, as public society is the main decision-making framework for the city's urban policies. The Ensanche 21 has decided in the last decades the policies of housing rehabilitation in the Casco Viejo de Bilbao. The neighborhood associations have often criticized these policies, as others have dedicated themselves to subsidizing only those who have enough money to pay for them, and not precisely for the residents who live in the most disadvantaged homes for lack of money. This makes it easier for impoverished residents to leave the neighborhood and for people who have money to buy their homes at a cheaper price. For example, to then turn to tourism, as seen in other cities. And the PP has also supported these policies in Ensanche 21.

The movements of Antépara and Perosanz can influence the future of the Old Town of Vitoria. They are the ones who have taken the flag of the location of the neighborhood, and the City Hall has partially approved Arabatur’s claim, giving these arguments a good one. On the contrary, the scarce decision that the institutions give to the neighbors in the decisions affecting the neighborhood is a complaint that has been repeated for decades in the Casco Viejo de Vitoria-Gasteiz. Information and debate on housing placement have also been scarce. And also, as we see, it's sometimes been disfigured.

First of all, in the Casco Viejo a large number of people have been organized in recent months against the turistification of housing. Why?

 

The blinds of the turistification

Experience has already shown what happens in places where there are no narrow limits to housing placement. Owners of homes for traditional rent tend to move to renting for tourists, or to sell to large companies and investors in the sector, as is the case in the Casco Viejo. Sometimes in self-interest, sometimes in pressure. These transformations have serious consequences in neighborhoods such as the Casco Viejo de Vitoria-Gasteiz.

On the one hand, the number of homes for rent is reduced and the price is increased. In the neighbourhood of the city where there are more neighbors (23%) who are forced to live for rent due to a lack of income. In addition, the homes in which the neighbors live would be filled with tourists who do not stay in the neighborhood, seriously jeopardizing community networks and neighborhood dynamics. For a more in-depth analysis of the consequences of the turistification you can go to the report Turistification of homes, Casco Viejo in order not to rehabilitate them (ARGIA, nº 2698).

"It's not too late to change, because the decision remains in the hands of the City Hall. It has not yet responded to the 136 claims made by neighbours against the decision to authorize the posting of full portals."

Turistification risks; vecindad guarantee

Policies on the touristic use of housing require a profound debate: the social and neighborhood models, the consequences of the turistification, the ways of making decisions, the decisions. An essential debate today in the Casco Viejo de Vitoria-Gasteiz, knowing how the tourist housing is being promoted. And that goes beyond the Arabatur Association and the Luxury Rental Apartments company, which will come later and later: The newspaper El Correo gave last May 15 the number one cover to the news: “A German group has planned 33 tourist apartments in the Palace of Álava, Velasco.” It is a palace of the Casco Viejo (others) abandoned for decades, which was occupied by the feminist movement of Vitoria-Gasteiz in December 2018 and evicted three months later by the Municipal Police.

It is not too late to change, as the decision is still in the hands of the City Hall. It has not yet responded to the 136 claims made by the neighbours against the decision to authorize the posting of full portals. And the new rules still need to be ratified in plenary. There is time and opportunity to meet the demands of the neighbours, so far there is no political will. In any case, the best guarantee to create other “wills” in the city hall, as in decades, remains the neighborhood and the citizen movement.