Inside Spain: Prefab homes and Spaniards' positive self-image
In this week's Inside Spain we look at how prefabricated homes have been pinpointed as a solution to the country's housing crisis and how Spaniards, particularly seniors, feel great about their physical appearance.
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has announced that the country’s new National Development Plan will be largely focused on the industrialisation of housing, thanks to a public investment of €1.3 billion over ten years.
The objective is to achieve 15,000 housing units per year as a way of addressing the severe lack of affordable housing in the country, which is contributing enormously to the steep rise in prices and rents.
"We need to build more, better, and faster," insisted Sánchez this week.
By housing industrialisation Spain’s PM is referring to the building of prefabricated properties, also known as prefab homes, a concept which hasn’t really taken off in Spain yet.
The concept is simple - they’re properties which are created with parts previously manufactured in a warehouse rather than following the traditional method of erecting walls and floors on site.
They’re also referred to as modular homes, and a similar trend is the emergence of container homes, made from ship containers.
It’s highly likely that the Spanish premier has realised that there is no way his government is going to be able to achieve his promises for social housing with the traditional methods of building, although the biggest stumbling block for many developers remains the amount of bureaucracy that comes with construction in Spain.
READ MORE: 'Red tape takes longer than building homes in Spain’
There’s also a fair degree of prejudice towards prefabricated homes in Spain, just as there has been with building with wood rather than concrete.
READ ALSO: Why does Spain build with concrete while the US uses wood?
But the truth is that innovation and other advances have seen the prefab industry become widespread globally in recent years.
They’re more cost-effective than traditional homes, they can be built and assembled up to 60 percent faster and require less manpower, something particularly important for Spain given the shortage of builders the country currently has.
The Canaries and Basque Country are among the autonomous communities in Spain which have committed to invest in industrialised housing on a regional level.
Sánchez also wants prefab homes to be prioritised in Valencia to help rebuild following last year’s devastating floods, with the aim of turning the eastern region into the first hub for industrial construction projects in Spain.
Currently, only 1.5 percent of homes in Spain are prefabricated and the country needs 600,000 units to meet demand.
In other news, a new study by Aegon has found that eight out of ten Spaniards say they feel good about their physique and appearance, with only a slight difference between men (84.7 percent) and women (77.8 percent).
Interestingly, the research concludes that Spaniards' self-image improves as they age.
Up to 86.2 percent of Spaniards over 65 surveyed see themselves as looking good, while in the 56-65 age group the percentage drops to 80.8 percent, and in the 41-55 age group it is 78 percent.
READ ALSO: Why are Spaniards so slim?
But perhaps Spaniards’ positive feelings aren’t unfounded. The 2024 Stada Health Report survey conducted among 46,000 people in 23 European countries found that Spaniards are in second place on the continent in terms of being physically active (62 percent), just four points behind the Finns in top spot and two points above Italians in third place (the European average is 50 percent).
This is no doubt one of the contributing factors to why Spaniards have the longest life expectancy in the EU and are on track to knock Japan off the top spot in the coming two decades.
READ ALSO: Why do people in Madrid live longer than anywhere else in the EU?
The Mediterranean diet also plays a key role in Spaniards' looking and feeling good, as well as living longer. A 2023 Survey on Eating Habits in Spain conducted by ALDI on a sample of more than 1,600 Spaniards found that 81 percent of respondents claim to maintain healthy eating habits.
However, the one aspect of their wellbeing that Spaniards perhaps have more of a tendency to ignore is mental health.
The 2024 Barometer on Self-Care for the Spanish Population prepared by Pic Solution found that Spaniards scored high in terms of proper hygiene (84 percent), nutrition and hydration (79 percent), and personal rest (70 percent), but they lagged behind when it came to caring for their mental and emotional wellbeing on a daily basis (38 percent).
In fact, Statista found that 17 percent of Spanish citizens suffer from mental health problems such as depression, anxiety, or burnout, and it’s been widely reported that Spaniards have a tendency to be self-medicators due to the lack of mental health services available in public healthcare.
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