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World · Housing and evictionsContinuing story · report 2 of 2

Maricarmen never returned home. Spain’s housing strike call continues

Thousands marched for the evicted pensioner who died before returning home. Unions are still backing a November 11 strike, while the reach of replacement tenant protections remains unclear.

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2 reports171 outlets373 sources31 videos

Full story
  1. Update 1After 70 Years in Her Madrid Home, an Eviction Becomes a Housing Protest Camp
  2. Update 2Maricarmen never returned home. Spain’s housing strike call continuesYou are here

What changed since our last report

17 days later

Then

After 70 Years in Her Madrid Home, an Eviction Becomes a Housing Protest Camp

What we said was still open

  1. No signed return agreement, final rent or approved decree has been established.

    Still open

    Replacement decrees were approved and published, but a signed return lease and final euro rent remain unverified. 107206207

  2. Whether the left unites behind one slate and candidate.

    Still open

    No agreed united-left slate or final candidate is established by this update.

  3. Whether any housing protections are restored before polling day, and whether Maricarmen Abascal returns home.

    Still open

    Abascal died without returning home, making a future return moot. The replacements’ precise enforceable protections and subsequent validation remain unconfirmed. 228206207

  4. Whether the PP needs Vox, and on what terms.

    Still open

    The election has not occurred; neither the PP’s coalition needs nor terms with Vox are established.

  5. Monday’s mediation, then Tuesday’s cabinet meeting and any parliamentary vote.

    Still open

    A return arrangement was announced and the cabinet approved replacements. No subsequent parliamentary validation outcome is verified. 1073

  6. Sumar's Frente Amplio presentation on 17 October, inside the coalition-registration window.

    Still open

    October 17 remains ahead; no completed presentation or verified coalition filing is established.

  7. Candidacy registration, 21–26 October, and the first polls taken after the call.

    Still open

    The reported October 21–26 registration period remains ahead, and no qualifying post-call national poll is established here.

Now

Thousands marched for the evicted pensioner who died before returning home. Unions are still backing a November 11 strike, while the reach of replacement tenant protections remains unclear.

What moved

  • A return arrangement was reported as accepted, with an eight-year tenancy and rent capped at 30% of income.
  • Abascal died at Gregorio Marañón Hospital without returning home.
  • Thousands marched from Puerta del Sol to her former home and installed an improvised altar outside.

Twenty-four hours is the length of the nationwide strike Spain’s largest union confederations have called over wages and housing for November 11. It would take the fight from occupied squares into workplaces across the country. UGT was still defending the action on October 13, six days after the death of María del Carmen Abascal, the 87-year-old whose eviction became a rallying point for Spain’s housing movement. 240 241

Abascal, known as Maricarmen, never regained her home. Public pressure secured an offer to return, but she died in hospital before it could happen. Her case now poses a harder question than whether politicians will acknowledge suffering: can protection arrive before a vulnerable tenant loses a home? 10

On October 8, we reported her death, the publication of replacement housing decrees and the announced November 11 strike. Those are not new developments. This update documents the memorial march that followed, the dispute over official tributes and UGT’s continued backing for the stoppage. Parliamentary validation and the decrees’ precise protection for particular tenants remain unconfirmed.

An offered return, never completed

  1. September 23, 2026

    Police and judicial officials evicted Abascal from her longtime Madrid home; she was carried out on a stretcher.

    10
  2. September 29, 2026

    A return arrangement was reported as accepted, with an eight-year tenancy and rent capped at 30% of income.

    107
  3. October 7, 2026

    Abascal died at Gregorio Marañón Hospital without returning home.

    230228
  4. October 8, 2026

    Thousands marched from Puerta del Sol to her former home and installed an improvised altar outside.

    233

The home she never regained

When we covered her eviction on September 27, her return was uncertain. She had a connection to the flat in Madrid’s Ibiza neighborhood, in Retiro, stretching back about seven decades. On September 23, police cordoned off the street and removed protesters before she was carried out. She was hospitalized afterward because of her fragile health. 10 230

Her lawyer, Beatriz Duro, confirmed her death without disclosing a cause. Eviction, hospitalization and death are an established sequence, not a medically demonstrated causal chain. Campaigners’ descriptions of heartbreak express their assessment of the ordeal; they do not supply a clinical finding. 10 8

The September 29 arrangement with Urbagestión reportedly offered eight years, with rent no higher than 30% of her income and a return after hospital discharge. An earlier account called it preliminary and referred to net income. Acceptance does not establish that a final lease was signed, and no final euro rent has been verified. She was never discharged to return. The Madrid Tenants’ Union said the solution came too late. 107 54 171 10

The rent history also remains unsettled. The Guardian’s October 8 account describes a proposed 230% increase; earlier tenant accounts described 275%. Earlier BBC reporting carried €500 rising to €2,650, which Urbagestión reportedly denied demanding. Those amounts would mean a 430% increase—not either reported percentage. The contractual baseline and company response have not been reconciled. The supported fact is that she could not afford the steep increase, not one definitive percentage. 7 214

Mourning outside, refusals inside institutions

Candlelit vigils on October 7 preceded the organized memorial march the following evening. Thousands walked from the Puerta del Sol protest camp to Abascal’s former home. The announced start was 20:00 Madrid time; the exact departure time is not independently established. The Guardian estimated attendance at about 20,000, but no counting method or independently verified total is available. 238 232 233 7

The Independent’s October 10 account separately described about 20,000 demonstrators across Spain after her death, without establishing their dates or overlap with the Madrid march. Those estimates cannot be added. Earlier reports of tens of thousands concerned the preceding weekend’s protests. 4 9

Inside institutions, even mourning became contentious. On October 8, the Madrid regional Assembly, Senate and Madrid City Council refused institutional minutes of silence. At the Assembly, the People’s Party blocked a proposal from PSOE and Más Madrid; those groups held their own silence outside before the plenary session. Opposition members also held a separate silence outside City Hall’s Cibeles headquarters. Neither PP nor Vox joined that tribute. 274 275 279 280 282

The Guardian’s October 8 report described opposition members thwarting an attempt to block a council silence; ARA and EFE described an institutional refusal. The separately documented tribute outside Cibeles explains how mourning could proceed despite official rejection. It does not establish that opposition members reversed a procedural block inside the chamber. 7 231 274 278

Far-right speculation about her death supplied no medical explanation. Vox’s suggestion that she would have had a home had she been a migrant from North Africa was likewise unsupported. It redirects attention from the documented rent dispute and delayed remedy toward an imagined alternative life. 7

Published measures, protection still unclear

The election announcement preceded her death. BBC News’s October 8 broadcast implied an October 7 call; NPR’s report that day placed it on Monday, October 5. The dated October 5 announcement confirms NPR’s chronology and supersedes the BBC date. Polling remains scheduled for November 29. The call followed Congress’s October 2 rejection of emergency housing decrees, not Abascal’s later death. 9 10 273

The cabinet approved 21 replacement measures on October 6. Decree-law 28/2026, concerning residential rental-contract stability, and 29/2026, concerning housing’s social function and affordable supply, were published on October 7. That establishes executive action and publication—not subsequent validation by the Diputación Permanente, the parliamentary body operating after dissolution. 3 206 207

Reports give October 8 for broader provisions and November 15 for lease-stability provisions, but the complete operative and transitional clauses are not established here. Eligibility, exceptions and case-specific eviction protection therefore remain unclear. Reports also differ over whether a possible October 16 sitting would consider the housing decrees; no official agenda confirms that vote. 181 182 256 257

The affordability pressure is real, but renters do not all experience it alike. Spain’s official index recorded 2024 national rent growth of 8.8% for new contracts against 2.8% for existing contracts. These are historical annual changes, not current Madrid figures or proof that every tenant’s rent doubled over a decade. 248

UGT and CCOO’s initial October 5 strike agreement preceded Abascal’s death and required governing-body ratification. Their October 7 joint notice fixed November 11. Its objective links better wages, decent housing and prices eroding purchasing power. UGT leader Pepe Álvarez reaffirmed the action on October 13; formal ratification votes are not documented, but no cancellation is established. 187 240 241

As aired 32 lines
  1. On October 8, we reported Maricarmen's death. Now unions are pursuing a nationwide strike. The November 11 call was already announced then. The latest development is that UGT was still pressing ahead on October 13.
  2. Thousands have marched in her memory, and politicians have fought over whether to honor her with a minute's silence. Other vulnerable renters still face a practical question. What protection can reach them before they lose their homes?
  3. Thousands walked from Puerta del Sol to Maricarmen's former home on October 8. The march began at the protest camp and ended in Madrid's Ibiza neighborhood, in Retiro. Mourners installed an improvised altar outside the building.
  4. The memorial crowd was estimated at about 20,000, although there's no confirmed count. The tenants' union had announced an eight o'clock evening start. The march followed candlelit vigils the previous night in Puerta del Sol and outside her former home.
  5. A separate estimate put demonstrations across Spain at about 20,000 after her death. Their dates and overlap with the Madrid march aren't clear, so those figures can't be added. Earlier crowds of tens of thousands belonged to the preceding weekend's protests.
  6. Protesters also stayed in tents at Puerta del Sol. Hundreds were described camping there in the earlier demonstrations. Her death brought fresh mourning to a place already occupied by people demanding affordable housing and stronger protection against eviction.
  7. Police and judicial officials carried María del Carmen Abascal out of her home on a stretcher on September 23. She was 87 and known as Maricarmen. Police cordoned off the street and removed protesters. She'd resisted three earlier eviction attempts and had a connection to the home stretching back about seven decades.
  8. Maricarmen died at Gregorio Marañón Hospital on October 7. She'd been hospitalized after the eviction because of her fragile health. Her lawyer, Beatriz Duro, confirmed her death without giving a cause. Campaigners blamed the ordeal, but no medical explanation has been disclosed.
  9. Maricarmen was evicted on September 23. Public pressure helped secure a return arrangement on September 29. It reportedly offered eight years, with rent no higher than 30 percent of her income. She died on October 7 before she could return.
  10. Her return depended on leaving hospital, and she was never discharged. The Madrid Tenants' Union said the arrangement came too late. Whether a final lease was signed, and what the rent would've been in euros, still isn't clear.
  11. Maricarmen couldn't afford the steep increase associated with the company that bought her flat. The proposed rise was reportedly 230 percent. Earlier tenant accounts described 275 percent. Those figures haven't been reconciled with the rent amounts carried in earlier coverage.
  12. One earlier account put the monthly rent at 500 euros, rising to 2,650. The owner, Urbagestión, reportedly denied demanding 2,650 euros. Those amounts would mean a 430 percent increase, with the final rent 5.3 times the starting amount.
  13. A later 1,650-euro offer was described as 300 euros above her pension. That implies a 1,350-euro pension, while another account put it near 1,000. Her actual pension hasn't been confirmed. The rent dispute remains unresolved even though the human outcome is clear.
  14. Three institutions refused official minutes of silence on October 8. At Madrid's regional Assembly, the People's Party blocked a proposal from the Socialists and Más Madrid. Those opposition groups held their own silence outside before the session. The Senate also refused an institutional tribute.
  15. Opposition members honored Maricarmen outside Madrid City Hall after the municipal government declined an official commemoration. The Socialists and Más Madrid held a silence outside Cibeles. PP and Vox didn't join. Opposition members also remembered her in their speeches inside.
  16. The separate tribute went ahead despite the refusal of an official one. It doesn't settle the competing descriptions of whether opposition members overturned an attempted block inside the council chamber.
  17. PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo accused Pedro Sánchez's government of manipulating public emotion and held Sánchez responsible for the eviction. The PP argued that political opponents were exploiting Maricarmen's death. Feijóo made the accusation on October 8.
  18. Far-right figures also cast doubt on the account of her death without supplying medical evidence. Vox claimed she would've had a home if she'd been a migrant from North Africa. It offered no evidence for that claim.
  19. Sánchez offered condolences on October 7, as did Housing Minister Isabel Rodríguez and Feijóo. Sánchez has made tenant protection central to his campaign. Opponents criticize his eight years in office, while he says regional authorities obstructed his housing measures.
  20. Ombudsman Ángel Gabilondo called for cooperation to prevent vulnerable people's evictions and provide enough social housing. On October 14, Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares linked the election to the housing-decree defeat and argued that social and fundamental rights were at stake.
  21. Albares framed the contest as a choice between a progressive government and a reactionary coalition. That's his political assessment of the election's stakes.
  22. Sánchez announced the election on October 5, two days before Maricarmen died. An earlier date of October 7 was wrong. The scheduled polling day remains November 29. The announcement followed Parliament's rejection of the government's emergency housing decrees.
  23. Congress rejected the first decree by 178 votes to 172, and the second by 184 to 166. Opposition votes included the PP, Vox and Junts. The housing protests formed part of the political pressure surrounding those defeats.
  24. The cabinet approved 21 replacement housing measures on October 6, and both replacement decrees were published on October 7. One concerns stability of rental contracts. The other concerns housing's social function and affordable supply. Their precise protection for individual tenants remains unclear.
  25. We still don't know whether Parliament's standing body, which operates after dissolution, has validated the replacements. Reported start dates are October 8 for broader provisions and November 15 for lease stability, but eligibility and exceptions remain unclear. There's also no confirmed agenda placing a housing vote at the possible October 16 sitting.
  26. New renters faced larger increases than existing tenants in the national rental-price index. In 2023, rents rose 2.6 percent overall. New contracts rose 4.1 percent, while existing contracts rose 2.4 percent.
  27. New-contract rent growth reached 8.8 percent in 2024. The overall increase was 3.5 percent, and existing contracts rose 2.8 percent. These are historical annual figures for Spain, and they don't measure Madrid's rents today.
  28. Rent-payment data show another gap. Increases generally stayed below 3 percent when the tenant and landlord didn't change. New-contract growth exceeded 10 percent year on year at the end of 2025. That's a separate measure based on direct-debit payments.
  29. Those figures show why one sweeping rent claim can mislead. They don't support saying every tenant's rent doubled over a decade. Asking prices, signed contracts and actual payments describe different parts of the housing market.
  30. UGT and CCOO agreed to a nationwide, 24-hour strike on October 5, before Maricarmen's death. Their joint notice fixed November 11 two days later. They want decent wages that make decent housing affordable, alongside action against prices eroding purchasing power.
  31. UGT leader Pepe Álvarez was still defending the November 11 action on October 13. He called for better wages, solutions to the housing crisis and progress in collective bargaining. The initial agreement required union ratification, whose formal votes haven't been confirmed.
  32. Maricarmen never regained her home. For other vulnerable tenants, cabinet approval and publication have happened, but the replacements' enforceable reach and parliamentary status remain unclear. The nationwide strike is called for November 11, followed by the general election on November 29.

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  1. r1First published.