Rona Pineda owns a thriving restaurant just off the harbor in Palma de Mallorca where she cooks up paella and Asian dishes for tourists streaming to the Mediterranean island. But it’s still not enough to comfortably afford to live there.
Driven by an influx of foreigners and an upscale shift in the tourism sector, soaring rents and housing prices in Mallorca and its neighboring island of Ibiza are pushing residents like Pineda into tough choices, with some even forced to live in vans.
“People are now looking at how to survive,” the 32-year-old said, who’s been sharing a two-bedroom apartment with another couple since the end of the pandemic. “If you have a normal salary, it’s very difficult to find a place to live nowadays.”
