The district of Aveiro aims to create 15 three-bedroom and two-bedroom flats in Sargaçal, and over the past few decades has regularly invested in creating social housing for families living in precarious conditions, especially in fishing neighbourhoods.

“The Municipality of Ovar has been working to ensure that all residents have decent housing conditions and this is another important step towards creating affordable housing in the region”, stated Domingo Silva, the mayor of the municipality.

The Social Democrat mayor added, “taking in to account the new buildings planned and also the solutions already in place, the municipality will soon have the capacity to support around 300 families, helping to improve their quality of life”.

A definitive date is yet to be set for the beginning of the construction work, as it will depend on the progress of the tender to award the contract, however, the project was finalised and approved in May, so the municipality predicts the work, once started, will take 18 months to complete.

As part of the Local Housing Strategy, this project is 100 percent financed by funds from the Recovery and Resilience Plan and the European Next Generation programme, specifically designed to respond to the economic and financial context generated by the covid-19 pandemic.

The selection of Sargaçal as the location of the flats was due to the fact that the municipality has land “with an area big enough to build the 30 units”, with a region “predominantly for housing”.

The construction of these houses joins a series of similar projects that the Ovar Town Hall is executing in other parts of the municipality, with the objective of improving housing conditions for families with less economic power. These works include the construction of another 13 flats in Rua do Seixal, underway since February, the construction of 52 flats on Avenida Dona Maria II, which began in May, and the refurbishment of three flats in São João de Ovar.

In addition to the refurbishment of 14 homes in Rua Frederico Ulrich, finalised in May, in the parish of Cortegaça, as well as the refurbishment of 50 flats in Furadouro, since 2022, and the refurbishment of four flats in Carcaval, also in Válega, after adapting a disused school building for this purpose.