January 28, 2026. Arnaiz, a leading firm in global urban planning and real estate development, recently took part in a roundtable organized by the Fundación Pro Real Academia De Jurisprudencia y Legislación de España on housing prices and land-use planning regulation. The event brought together some of the most authoritative voices in academia and professional practice on this topic at the national level.
Arnaiz was represented by its founder and president, Leopoldo Arnaiz, in a session chaired by Luis María Cazorla Prieto, president of the Real Academia de Jurisprudencia y Legislación de España, the institution that hosted the event. The session also featured contributions from other experts and academics in the field of urban planning regulation and housing prices, including Tomás-Ramón Fernández Rodríguez, Professor of Administrative Law and Full Member of the Real Academia de Jurisprudencia y Legislación de España; Luciano Parejo Alfonso, Professor of Administrative Law at Carlos III University of Madrid; and José Manuel Serrano Alberca, Counsel to the Spanish Parliament and Trustee of the Fundación Pro Real Academia.
During the session, speakers agreed that excessive regulation at both national and regional levels creates a bottleneck that slows down land development. This situation leads to urban developments in Spain taking several decades to materialize, preventing an increase in housing supply in the short term in line with current demand. In this regard, urban planning architect Leopoldo Arnaiz Eguren stressed the need to move toward greater administrative agility: “The problem lies in the lack of serviced land and the slowness of procedures. We must streamline legislation, promote public-private collaboration, and ensure sufficient financing for developers and buyers.”
During the event, several measures were also discussed, including the importance of expediting urban planning procedures without compromising legal and environmental safeguards; the need to limit repetitive sectoral reports; the suitability of distinguishing between the nullity of plans and that of regulations; as well as the challenge Spain faces in designing and implementing a robust, long-term public strategy to create public housing.
It was also emphasized that it would be important to amend national legislation to provide greater legal certainty, reduce the prescriptive scope of regional plans to gain flexibility, and strengthen coordination among the three levels of government.
For more information:
ATREVIA
Carlos C. Ungría – cungria@atrevia.com / +34 672 44 70 65
Raquel Nueno – rnueno@atrevia.com / +34 644 273 00
