ASPE, the Supreme Confederation of Large Families in Greece, has raised the issue of the income threshold for potential beneficiaries, which does not take into account the large families.
According to a recent article from RND (German reporters’ network): This is the reality faced by “many Greek women and men,” the journalist says. “People over 30 continue to live with their parents because they cannot find an affordable apartment. According to data from the Bank of Greece, housing prices in Attica have risen by 88% since 2017 — and by 69% on average across the country — with rental prices following suit.”
Greek government has just launched the program “My house 2” which aims to provide a total of 2 billion euros of funding to help 20,000 potential beneficiaries to get a loan for buying a house. For large families, the program has a provision for the amount of interest (only for the part provided by Banks) to be subsidized by 50%. However, ASPE, a member of ELFAC has criticized the program for not having any
provision for large families, such as an increase of the amount of the loan as well as its repayment period based on the number of children, since the major issue for large families is finding a suitable property for their decent housing.
ASPE, the Supreme Confederation of Large Families in Greece, has also raised the issue of the income threshold for potential beneficiaries, which does not take into account the large families. In terms of social justice and demographic/family policy, the income limit of 28,000 euros set by the program, regardless of the composition of the family, is extremely problematic and unfair for large families. For a large family with four (4) children, the upper limit of 28,000 euros means an annual per capita income of 4,666 € (28,000 divided by 6), below the poverty line! For large families with five (5) children, the upper limit of 28,000 euros means an annual per capita income of 4,000 euros, which decreases even more as the number of children in the family increases. Therefore, the more the number of children in a large family increases, the more dramatically the probability of its exclusion from the program increases!
There is a lot to be done by the government in order to set up a fair and large-families aware social housing policy that will allow families to grow, to have access to affordable housing and support the decision of the family to acquire as many children as they wish, without discrimination.