María Teresa is retired and is 80 years old but the lifestyle she leads, much to her, is that of a young university student. With a rent to pay 1,200 euros per month and a Social Security pension (retirement and widowhood) of 840 euros, you must share floor with students to get ahead. But it also lives in Barcelona, one of the cities with the most expensive square meter in Spain. To give an example, at the end of July 2025, the square meter was paid at 23.4 euros, 8.3% more than last year, according to Idealistic.
Taking these figures into account, not only the mortgage price has been triggered, but the rent has also risen. This 80 -year -old woman pays 1,200 euros, an unassumable amount for her who also exceeds the Minimum Interprofessional Salary (SMI) which is 1,184 euros in 14 payments. The Creator of Content Jire4 He has interviewed Maria Teresa for her YouTube channel that has had all sincerity, how being retired has no money to pay a house and must share it with university students.
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Although in these cases it is usual to find Retiree stories that have returned to work, To complete the pension with a salary or simply earn extra money, it is not the case of this Catalan.
With a pension of 840 euros, you have to enter extra money by renting rooms
The pensioner receives 840 euros of the Social Security per month, a very low amount considering that he must pay the rent to her homemade every month and that the price of food, light or fuels It does not stop climbing. “I am very fair, if it were not because I have students at home I could not survive. I am a widow, a pensioner with 80 years and I have a great insecurity because here (in Barcelona) I can not rent a room to students, it is prohibited.”
Therefore, he does not hesitate to ask for help “an amparo, for the age I have and to survive. I do not want to continue in this way, I have no other income. It has had to impose certain prohibitions such as eating fish or continuing with the medical insurance he had.
It began, like many other Spanish retirees, to work being very young. In his case, with 17 years but during his professional career he has spent very little time registered in Social Security. And, of course, few quotes, in the end it is a smaller pension. “In those days if you adjusted a little with the salary they did not discharge you, it was already convenient to win more.”
“I didn’t think about my retirement, tomorrow”
María Teresa explains to the well -known YouTuber that “I didn’t think about retirement, I didn’t think about tomorrow and tomorrow has arrived.” Remember that “legally” has quoted 11 years. “When I hear the news in which they talk about the retirement of the future … I don’t know how it will work, because I will not see it anymore.”
The interviewer, who is very young, asks “Do you think that with the 17 years I have currently I will be able to charge a pension?” She is sharp, “I can’t answer this because politics is as it is.”
“They (politicians) would tell them to be honest, to stop living from the story and have a normal salary.”