Maricarmen, the woman who became a symbol of Spain’s housing crisis, dies at 87

Maricarmen Abascal, the woman whose eviction became a rallying cry against Spain’s housing crisis, died on Wednesday at Madrid’s Gregorio Marañón Hospital at the age of 87, the Tenants’ Union announced in a statement.

On September 23, she was evicted from her apartment in Madrid’s Retiro district, the home where she had lived for seven decades. Six years earlier, an investment company had purchased the property at a heavily discounted price precisely because it was occupied by Abascal. Living on a €1,400 ($1,560) monthly pension, she had never stopped paying her rent under Spain’s old rent-control system, nor had she fallen behind on utility bills, which together amounted to about €500 ($560) a month.

In 2020, the owners informed her that she would have to leave, arguing that the lease had already been transferred twice: first to her mother, who had not been formally listed as the tenant under a Franco-era law, and later to Abascal herself. From that point on, they attempted to evict her on four separate occasions. According to supporters, the owners rejected every proposal put forward, whether to cover the difference between her existing rent and the market rate, which they said should

In the statement, signed jointly by the Tenants’ Union, Abascal’s family and her lawyer, they noted that she had been hospitalized since the eviction. “Although a historic agreement was reached that would have allowed her to return to her home, that solution came too late,” they said.

The statement argues that the events following her eviction, including mass demonstrations, protest encampments in public squares, a snap election and the call for a general strike, marked “a before and after in the history of this country.” At the same time, they warned that “the cost of getting here has been far too high.”

They concluded with the message Abascal repeatedly asked them to share: “Keep fighting. Keep fighting for what belongs to you.”

Thanks to public pressure, Spain came close to witnessing an unprecedented outcome: an evicted tenant returning to her home after the property’s owners agreed to sign a new lease. Even so, the eviction and the years of legal battles that preceded it took a heavy toll on Maricarmen’s health. In her final years, she relied on a wheelchair to get around and needed assistance with daily tasks. Behind her were nearly seven years of court proceedings in her fight to remain in her home.

In recent months, her physical condition had deteriorated significantly. She had lost muscle mass, struggled to eat and said even her voice had changed. “It has affected me in everything. I’m not myself anymore,” she said two days before leaving her home.

Maricarmen has become a symbol, both in Spain and beyond. Even after losing her home, she continued to urge people to stand up for their rights.

“I would like to be there with you, to join you in your encampment, in your struggle, but I’m not fortunate enough to do so. So from here I ask all of you to be brave. Fight, defend what is yours and, please, take care of yourselves. Keep camping out for as long as your bodies can endure it,” she said from hospital, exhausted after the eviction.

Thousands of people who, outraged and inspired by her story, took to the streets in Madrid and later in cities across Spain, shared and treasured her videos. The woman who had started it all was urging them to hold the line. And they did.

Everyone called her Maricarmen, but her full name was María del Carmen Abascal. In 1956, her father rented the apartment in Madrid’s Ibiza neighborhood, and she spent virtually her entire life there, alongside her mother and brother. She studied shorthand typing and secretarial work, spent 34 years as secretary to the board of directors of a pharmaceutical company, and retired in 1998.

Retirement, she liked to say, did not alter her routine all that much. She got up at 9 a.m. each day, enjoyed strolling through the neighborhood, shopping at the butcher’s on the corner and tending to the countless objects that filled her home: paintings, collectibles from her tea table and porcelain figurines.

“I have worked all my life,” she would say with pride. It was the same pride with which she showed visitors the black-and-white photographs of her family, among the few belongings she took with her to the hospital after being evicted.

Maricarmen was a strong-willed woman. “I’m going to fight until the end,” she repeated time and again in every interview she gave. Determined, and at times tough, she never wavered in her belief that the fight was worth pursuing. Even in her final days, when she no longer had the strength to carry it on herself, she asked her “family” at the Tenants’ Union, as she referred to the organization’s members, to keep fighting on her behalf.

The last time EL PAÍS visited her at home, two days before her eviction, she said through tears that she hoped she had served as a beacon in the struggle to ensure that everyone has access to decent housing.

Maricarmen was a woman of strong character. “I’m going to fight until the end,” she would say time and again in interviews. Tenacious, sometimes stern. She was always determined to fight and until her final days, when she no longer had strength, she asked her fellow members of the Tenants’ Union — as she called them — to keep fighting for her. The last time this newspaper visited her home, two days before her eviction, she said through tears that she only hoped she had been a light in the struggle so that everyone could have decent housing.

She was more than a beacon. She became an icon whose cause filled public squares across Spain. The slogan “We Are All Maricarmen” appeared on placards and T-shirts nationwide. She often said that her wish was to die in the room where she had seen both her father and mother pass away, the home where she had lived, until her eviction, for the last 71 years.

Before leaving her apartment, surrounded by packed boxes, Maricarmen recalled every corner of the home as though it were an extension of herself. “All my memories are here. My father died very young, in 1960, at the age of 51. And my mother died in this house in 2005. I’ve lived here from 1956 until today.” Every painting and every item in her collection, displayed on her tea table, carried memories of a life she did not want to say goodbye to.

She also confessed that she was not religious. “Those of us at the bottom are all the same,” she said. Yet every night before going to sleep, she would say goodnight, in this order: to God, to her parents, to Pope Francis and to the family members she had lost. In the final chapter of her life, she had two wishes: to die at home and to have her ashes rest in the Cantabrian Sea.

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