Medium Tagus meets with IHRU to accelerate affordable housing

A Middle Tagus Intermunicipal Community (MIC) met today with the Government and the Urban Housing and Rehabilitation Institute (IHRU) to accelerate affordable housing projects and define the property management model.

In a statement, the CIM Médio Tejo informs that the meeting, held in Tomar, in the district of Santarém, brought together mayors, municipal technical teams, the Secretary of State for Housing and the president of IHRU, at a time when there are houses scheduled to be made available in December and January.

According to the intermunicipal community, several projects are at an advanced stage of implementation, with priority being the definition of the management model of the future housing park, to allow the allocation and administration of housing.

The validation of this model is considered “essential” to ensure the operationalization of the assignment processes of houses, some of which may be in a position to be made available in the next two months.

The meeting, according to the CIM, also made it possible to evaluate the implementation of the Cooperation Protocol for the Development of Housing Projects at Accessible Costs, concluded in June 2023 between the CIM and the IHRU, as well as the state of implementation of the collaboration agreements with the municipalities.

The initial protocol provided for the construction or rehabilitation of up to 1,132 housing intended for accessible leases, in an overall investment estimated at around €148.5 million (ME).

According to the CIM management report At the end of that year, a total of 51 cooperation agreements were concluded, corresponding to the construction or rehabilitation of 564 fires, in an investment planned at around 82.5 ME, including VAT.

These figures represent approximately half of the housing target initially provided for in the Protocol, although they correspond to cooperation agreements and not necessarily to completed houses.

Another of the topics discussed today was the review of the cooperation protocol, and the Middle Tagus CIM recalled that it proposed to IHRU, in July this year, an update of the document, considering the projects being implemented and others still under study by the municipalities.

The meeting also addressed the contractual conditions and operationalisation of financing through the European Investment Bank (EIB), including the transition from projects currently funded by the Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP) to this new mechanism.

The need to find solutions to ensure continuity of investments arises after the mayors had warned, in September 2025, of difficulties in meeting the deadlines of the RRP, due to the slow administrative procedures and the constraints associated with the execution of the contracts.

At the time, the president of CIM Médio Tejo, Manuel Jorge Valamatos, defended, in statements to Lusa, a faster process conducted by the IHRU and the extension of the funding deadlines, to avoid compromising the housing projects planned for the region.

The management report of 2025 of the intermunicipal community also identifies difficulties in hiring contracts, with competitions that became deserted, a situation that motivated negotiations with the IHRU and the protection to update the costs of promoting housing and adjust the prices based on the reality of the market.

According to CIM, today's meeting sought to strengthen the articulation between the entities involved and overcome constraints that condition the implementation of investments and the availability of new housing solutions.

CIM Médio Tejo comprises 11 municipalities: Abrantes, Alcanena, Constância, Entroncamento, Ferreira do Zêzere, Mação, Ourém, Sardoal, Tomar, Torres Novas and Vila Nova da Barquinha.