Morro Jable faces a critical housing shortage for hospitality workers

Morro Jable, in the municipality of Pájara and the tourist engine of southern Fuerteventura, faces a contradiction that repeats every high season: hotels and restaurants in the area need to hire staff, but a large share of those workers cannot find anywhere to live near their jobs.

Housing taken up by tourist use

According to sources in the hotel industry, much of Morro Jable's housing stock is now used for holiday lets or as second homes for foreign owners, leaving very little room for flats available on long-term lets for the very workers who staff the sector.

Staff living more than half an hour from work

Faced with a lack of options in Morro Jable and along the rest of the Jandía coast, a growing number of hospitality workers are choosing to live in Puerto del Rosario or in municipalities in the centre of the island, taking on daily commutes of more than half an hour, according to union sources in the tourism sector.

Shared rentals become the norm

Rental prices in the area, driven up by tourist demand, have made flat-sharing among several workers standard practice, according to industry sources, even among those holding mid-level positions of responsibility in hotel establishments.

Proposals for staff housing

Some hotel chains in the south of the island are exploring staff housing schemes, either by renting entire blocks of flats or through agreements with local developers, as a way to hold on to their workforce given the lack of residential alternatives around Morro Jable.

High staff turnover driven by the housing shortage

Union sources in the tourism sector warn that the shortage of affordable housing in Morro Jable directly contributes to the high staff turnover affecting several hotel establishments in the area. Workers who cannot secure stable housing, according to these same sources, opt to move to jobs in destinations with better accommodation, forcing hotels to absorb extra training and recruitment costs every season.

A coastline, Jandía's, geared entirely towards tourist accommodation

The entire Jandía coastal strip, of which Morro Jable is the main hub, has one of the highest densities of tourist beds in the Canary Islands, leaving very little residential housing available against the overwhelming weight of hotels, tourist flats and second homes, according to data from property portals. This coastal make-up largely explains why the workers' housing problem is more acute here than in other municipalities on the island.

Models already tried in other tourist destinations

Sources in the hotel sector point to experiences in other well-established tourist destinations, both in the Canary Islands and the Balearics, where hotel chains have opted to buy or rent entire housing blocks for the exclusive use of their staff. Bringing that model to Morro Jable would first require overcoming the shortage of available land and the already high prices reached by any property in the area, according to the same sources.