Scores of people queue outside Housing Institute to apply for rent subsidies

Scores of people waited in line on Monday morning outside Portugal’s Institute of Housing and Urban Requalification in Lisbon to take one of 20 tickets made available daily to apply for State subsidies to help pay for rents.

The ‘Door-to-Door’ movement called for a protest this Monday at the IHRU offices, between 7:30 am and 9:30 am, to demand a service that responds to requests for income support, and they will send letters to the Secretary of State for Housing and the Minister of Infrastructure and Housing, according to the movement’s spokesman, André Escoval.

“There are problems up and down the country, with cuts in rent support and in the ‘Porta 65’ programme and there are only 10 tickets given out in the morning and 10 tickets in the afternoon for face-to-face service, in Lisbon and Porto. It is impossible to do it over the Internet or by telephone,” André Escoval told Lusa.

The movement in defense of the right to housing has criticised the lack of response from the IHRU, speaking of delays of “more than a year”, which lead “several families to despair throughout the country”.

Around 300 people applying for subsidies through the Extraordinary Rent Support Programme  (PAER) queued outside the IHRU office in Lisboa, 23 October 2025. TIAGO PETINGA/LUSA
Copyright: © 2025 LUSA – Agência de Notícias de Portugal, S.A.

SOURCE: Lusa