The right to housing · Portugal
A wage has to be enough
to pay for a home.
House prices have almost tripled in ten years, a rise nearly three times the EU average, and wages haven’t kept up. This isn’t fate: other European countries have housing policies that work, and research shows which ones. We demand that they be applied here, without further delay.
Portuguese Constitution · Article 65
“Everyone shall possess the right for themselves and their family to an adequately sized dwelling that provides hygienic and comfortable conditions and preserves personal and family privacy.”
A right written into the Constitution in 1976. Fifty years on, it is still not honoured.
Housing for all Rents that fit our wages Stable leases More homes, faster Public and cooperative housing Empty homes back in use No eviction without somewhere to go
National housing march, .
6 days to go. 15 cities, most at 15:00.
Agenda
Coming up
Saturday
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Manifestação Casa Para Viver: Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Covilhã
Covilhã, Jardim Público
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Casa Para Viver: Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Setúbal
Setúbal, Praça do Quebedo
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Casa Para Viver: Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Portalegre
Portalegre, Bairro dos Assentos
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Casa para Viver – Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Nazaré
Nazaré, Avenida Vieira Guimarães
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National housing march in Lisbon
Lisbon, Alameda D. Afonso Henriques
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National housing march in Porto
Porto, Praça do Marquês
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National housing march in Aveiro
Aveiro, Estação de Aveiro
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Casa para Viver – Coimbra
Coimbra, Ponte de Santa Clara
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Casa para Viver – Viseu
Viseu, Rossio
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Casa Para Viver: Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Braga
Braga, Arco da Porta Nova
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Casa para Viver: Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Leiria
Leiria, Fonte Luminosa
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Manifestação Casa para Viver – Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Vila Real
Vila Real, Avenida Carvalho Araújo
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Manifestação Casa para Viver – Não nos vão roubar o direito a morar – Beja
Beja, Casa da Cultura
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National housing march in Viana do Castelo
Viana do Castelo, Praça da República
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time TBC
Housing march in Ponta Delgada
Ponta Delgada, Portas da Cidade
Tuesday
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time TBC
Rally on State Budget vote day
Lisbon, Assembleia da República
News
Latest news from the street
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· Acampada de Lisboa
A acampada não tem rosto, tem organização coletiva
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· Acampada de Lisboa
Decisões da Assembleia Popular de 7/11!
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· Acampada Faro
Sábado dia 7, foi marcado pela Acampada no Jardim Manuel Bivar
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· Acampada Porto
Vem domingar connosco!
Media
Latest news in the media
What newspapers, radio and television are publishing about housing. Headlines are as published, in Portuguese, and each story opens on the outlet’s own site.
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CNN Portugal ·
“Temos de um lado as pessoas que investiram em habitação e do outro pessoas que olham para a habitação como necessidade. Não há respostas com resultados neutros para qualquer um dos lados” (opens in a new tab)
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CNN Portugal ·
Advogado dos manifestantes diz que acampada “tem sido exemplar”: Jovens são “dignos representantes do que deve ser uma legitima e responsável liberdade de manifestação” (opens in a new tab)
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Diário de Notícias ·
As Vozes da Acampada (opens in a new tab)
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Jornal de Negócios ·
Secretária de Estado da Habitação: contratos já em vigor também têm isenções da renda acessível (opens in a new tab)
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Público ·
Carneiro usa palavras de Cavaco para acusar Governo de incompetência na habitação (opens in a new tab)
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Público ·
Acampada pela habitação manteve tendas no Rossio, apesar de Renata Cambra defender retirada (opens in a new tab)
The crisis in numbers
It’s not a feeling. These are the official figures.
+180%
rise in house prices in Portugal from 2015 to 2025. EU average: +65%.
Eurostat
€17.79/m²
median rent on new leases in Lisbon. For a 70 m² flat, that’s about €1,245 a month: more than a full month’s minimum wage.
INE, Q2 2026
723,000
empty homes in Portugal, 12% of all housing.
INE, 2021 Census
≈2%
of homes are public housing, one of the lowest shares in Europe.
ISCTE, 2025
Our demands
Six proposals, each tried and tested elsewhere
01
Reverse the rent law
Reverse the 2012 law that scrapped minimum lease terms and made it easier to end leases without a reason: stable leases as the norm, as in Germany, the Netherlands, France and Spain, while landlords keep the right to recover their home from tenants who don’t pay.
02
An end to demolitions and evictions without somewhere to go
No demolition of lived-in homes and no eviction without an alternative home, as the Housing Framework Law already requires when the State evicts, and as Portugal has committed to before the UN and the Council of Europe.
03
A brake on investment funds buying up homes
Curb purchases of existing homes by funds and large investors in the areas under most pressure, end the tax breaks that give them an edge, and use the pre-emption right the law already gives councils, without holding back anyone building new homes.
04
More public housing
Bring the public and cooperative housing stock closer to European levels, with stable funding after the EU recovery plan, mixed-income neighbourhoods as in Vienna, and a fund that pays for itself from rents, as in Denmark.
05
A public drive to bring empty buildings back into use as homes
A public programme to bring empty homes and buildings back into use, starting with the State’s own: first through agreements and help with renovation, as in Ireland and Scotland, and only for buildings left empty for a long time the tools the law already provides.
06
Rent caps that are truly affordable
Make “affordable rent” mean affordable to the people who work here: caps tied to incomes, not just to the market, in programmes with public money or tax breaks, and in the private market reference rents for each area, as in Germany, with new homes exempt.
Everyone’s problem
At home, at work, in the neighbourhood
In 2025, 27% of Portuguese households renting at market prices spent more than 40% of their income on housing, against 19% across the EU (Eurostat). When a home takes almost half your income, little is left for anything else. Housing isn’t a separate issue: it decides what’s left of your wages, where you can live and whether your neighbourhood stays alive.
Tenants
At home
Know your rights, get together with your neighbours and join a tenants’ association. Tenants who know the law and organise can stop unlawful increases and evictions without legal grounds.
Workers
At work
In 2022, the government, the UGT union confederation and the employers’ confederations signed an incomes agreement that put the minimum wage on a path to €900 by 2026. When rents rise faster, that effort is lost. The cost of housing has to be part of wage talks: raise it with your employer, your workmates and your union.
Residents
In the neighbourhood
Local shops, schools, health centres: a neighbourhood without residents loses them all. In the parishes with the most tourism, house prices rose up to 32% more than elsewhere (Franco and Santos, 2021).
Housing has been a right in the Constitution since 1976. Honouring it isn’t a question of left or right: it’s the duty of every government.
Not the first time
When residents organised, they gained rights
1974
Occupations and residents’ committees
Right after the revolution of 25 April, thousands of families occupied empty homes and set up residents’ committees. Housing became one of the great demands of the revolution.
1976
Housing in the Constitution
Article 65 of the Constitution gives everyone the right to adequate housing and makes the State responsible for delivering it.
2023
Back on the streets
The Casa Para Viver platform brings dozens of movements together and fills the streets of cities across the country.
2026
Tents in the square
In October, tent camps in Lisbon’s Rossio and Porto’s Praça D. João I bring housing to the heart of both cities. The police clear them, but the protests keep growing, and on 24 October thousands march in Lisbon and Porto.
Watch
Gentrification on film
The Left Hand Rotation collective was filming gentrification long before the word reached the newspapers. Based in Lisbon since 2011, it documents how tourism and speculation empty neighbourhoods, and between 2010 and 2021 it took its “Gentrificación no es un nombre de señora” workshops to 17 cities in 9 countries. Its films are free to watch.
O que vai acontecer aqui?
The movements defending the right to live in Lisbon, told by the people resisting evictions. Made with Habita! and Stop Despejos.
Terramotourism
In 1755, an earthquake destroyed Lisbon. Today the city shakes with a tourist earthquake that pushes the people who live there out of the centre.
Alfama é Marcha
Alfama gets ready for its marcha, the neighbourhood’s parade in Lisbon’s June festivities, and a question remains: how do you stop neighbourhood life from becoming folklore for tourists?
O nosso último filme sobre Lisboa
From Expo 98 to the latest protests, including the demolition of Bairro da Jamaica in Seixal. Premiered at DocLisboa on 22 October 2026, it will be free to watch on the collective’s website.
The videos are hosted on Vimeo and only load when you press “Watch the film”. From then on, Vimeo may store cookies in your browser.
Solidarity
Causes we support
Standing up for your home also means standing up for the place where you live. These are causes Cultura no Muro supports, and we invite you to get to know them.
Quinta dos Ingleses: luxury flats where homes are missing
On the last big green space next to Carcavelos beach, the plan is to build around 850 luxury flats.
Covas do Barroso: the village that doesn’t want a mine
A village in Barroso, an FAO-recognised agricultural heritage site, is fighting four open-pit lithium mines.
You’re not alone
Who’s campaigning for housing
Movements, associations and collectives standing up for the right to a home in Portugal. Get to know them and join in.
Housing is a right.
Let’s make sure it’s honoured.
Join the people getting organised in buildings, neighbourhoods and workplaces all over Portugal.