**3. Results**

The results of the descriptive analysis of the housing and socio-demographic indicators are shown below. Starting with the analysis that shows the use of the housing stock in the historic centers of Seville and Cádiz, the existing concentration of tourist rentals and the difference in the income generated by tourist rentals are compared to conventional rentals. Next, the changes in the population of the historic centers are observed, studying processes of a socio-demographic nature. This will allow us to launch hypotheses, in the conclusions section, on the relationship and the differences between the two case studies.

#### *3.1. Tourist Housing and Rent Differential*

Table 3 represents the amount of secondary, empty, and rented dwellings and their variation between the last two population censuses.

**Table 3.** Percentage of secondary, empty, and rented dwellings in Seville and Cádiz and their historic centers (2001–2011). Source: Prepared by the authors with data from population and housing census 2001–2011 [31].


As usual in Andalusian cities, the greatest percentage of rentals in both cities is concentrated in their respective historic centers. However, the percentage of rentals is much greater in the case of the historic center of Cádiz, where it oscillates around half of the main dwellings, while in Seville it is above a quarter.

Furthermore, there is a much greater proportion of secondary and empty dwellings in the case of the historic center of Seville than in the case of Cádiz. In Seville, the intercensal period marks a certain residential dynamism, as the proportion of empty housing diminishes and secondary housing remains stagnant, while rental housing increases slightly, although less than in the city as a whole. The opposite is true in Cádiz, where renting is falling, losing up to 10 points in the historic center, and the percentage of vacant and secondary dwellings is increasing. Developments in Seville seem to correspond to demographic growth, rejuvenation, and increase of the foreign population in the first decade of the 21st century, from 7180 foreigners in the city in 2001 to 39,000 in 2013, as can be seen in the data provided by the Population Register of the National Institute of Statistics. This brings into play a greater number of dwellings, many of which are rented. In the case of Cádiz, the real estate market in this period seems to be increasingly directed to other forms of tenure, mainly ownership, and also to secondary dwellings.

We continue our work with Table 4, which analyzes the touristification of housing and centralization of tourist housing.

**Table 4.** Touristification of housing and centralization of tourist housing (2019). Source: Prepared by the authors with data from Datahippo.


Table 4 shows that the number of tourist dwellings varies greatly between the historic center of Cádiz and that of Seville, and is much higher in the latter, reflecting its larger size in terms of surface area and population. The indicator of the centralization of this type of dwelling, which aims to reflect the proportion of the total number of tourist rentals in the municipality that are located in the historic center, reveals a similar figure, with over 60% of this type of housing concentrated in the historic centers, which shows the prominence of tourist housing in this type of space.

Finally, the touristification of housing shows a much higher figure in Seville, up to 18.24 points, compared to 6.51 points in the historic center of Cádiz, which implies that, in the historic center of Seville, tourist housing was approaching 20% of the total housing stock (main and other types). Through Airbnb and Idealista, we searched for an approximation of the difference in rent between the value of conventional rentals and tourist rentals. The data was calculated on an annual basis. It was calculated for dwellings with two bedrooms. Taking into account the strong seasonal variation of tourist rentals, the difference between high and low season was calculated. It should be recalled that the dates used to calculate the high season were Carnival in Cádiz and Easter in Seville. Two significant assumptions are made here. First, it is assumed that there are three months of high season in both cities. Second, it is assumed that the tourist accommodation would be rented for the whole month in the high season and half of the month in the low season.

We continue with Table 5, which shows the difference in profit a tenant would make between a conventional and a tourist rental.

**Table 5.** Annual rent differential in two-bedroom homes. Source: Prepared by the authors with data from Airbnb and Idealista.com.


In the center of Seville, there is a difference of 58.02% more profit for the tourist rental of a property, while in the historic center of Cádiz the difference is even greater, reaching 75.08%. This difference justifies the move from conventional rentals to tourist rentals. These benefits would multiply in the months with the greatest influx of tourists. For a month during high season in Seville, the lessor would obtain €5000 more profit on average than a conventional rental. This difference, in Cádiz, amounts to more than €7000.

## *3.2. Socio-Demographic Changes and Gentrification*

During the second half of the 20th century, the historic centers of the cities of Seville and Cádiz were experiencing strong population decline. They were generally losing population to other neighborhoods in their respective cities or to their metropolitan areas and were ageing markedly. Urban renewal in this type of historic centers, which is widespread in cities of a certain size in Spain, took place from the 1990s onwards [32].

The data on the historic centers of Seville and Cádiz are shown in Table 6.

In Table 6, we can see how the historic center of Cádiz has more population weight than Seville, despite the fact that Cádiz has lost inhabitants and Seville has gained them. 30.01% of the city's total population still lives in the historic center of Cádiz, while in Seville the figure is only 8.19%. Beyond this, the behavior of the two historic centers is notoriously dissimilar. The historic center of Cádiz has continued to lose population by more than 6700 inhabitants for the whole period. The loss of the demographic percentage of the historic center was very rapid in the first years of the 21st century. However, these losses in favor of the city as a whole have slowed down since 2009, gaining a greater proportion between this year and 2012 only to fall again from this date onwards, albeit slightly.


**Table 6.** Changes in the population of the historic centers of Cádiz and Seville. Prepared by the authors with data from the Population Register and the National Statistics Institute (INE).

> In this process, the ageing of the population decreased notably, from 36% to 28% of the population, and was also accompanied by an increase in the transnationalisation of the historic center, albeit a very moderate one. In Seville, on the other hand, the demographic percentage of the population of the historic center has increased in the period 2001–2018, though only slightly. The population percentage increased notably in the first decade of the 21st century and until 2012, after which it began to decrease in share in the city as a whole. The total number of residents in the historic center of Seville has been increasing significantly, year after year, since the beginning of the 21st century, reaching more than 60,000 residents. This trend has slowed and reversed since 2013, and in this time the number of residents has fallen by 3653, erasing much of the previous growth. During this period, the ageing of the population hardly changed in Seville and there was a greater transnationalization than in the case of Cádiz, although the percentage of foreigners barely surpassed 6% of the population. In Cádiz, ageing has declined more or less constantly; in Seville, while the demographic percentage of the center grew, it also grew younger, but since 2013, when this growth slowed down, it has been ageing again year by year.

> On the other hand, it is noticeable how the increase in the proportion of foreigners has been constant from year to year, but has started to decrease in both cities, precisely from 2013 onwards, coinciding in both cases with the halt of previous trends of population increase in Seville or the halting of the demographic decline in Cádiz.

> In short, in the case of Seville, there is a clear change in demographic trends, with a turning point in 2012, which is much more subdued in the historic center of Cádiz. In the period prior to 2013, there was a growth in the population, accompanied by an increase in the percentage of the foreign population and a rejuvenation of the population, which implies some kind of replacement of the older population with the entry of new settlers, young people and with a certain proportion of foreign population. The case of Cádiz is similar, but this process only allowed for a certain slowdown of the population decline between 2005 and 2012. The subsequent population decline from 2013 onwards in the historic center of Seville implies a loss of the foreign population and a new ageing, which indicates that the population lost in this period is a young population that includes foreigners. This last point can also be extended to the historic center of Cádiz, although in this case the ageing process did not stop during the entire series of data.

> The following table shows the indicators of gentrification and transnational gentrification in the historic center of Seville and Cádiz.

> In Table 7, the gentrification rates show a positive variation during the study period for both cases, although the increase is rather mild. The general gentrification rate is higher in the historic center of Cádiz, above 4%, coinciding with an increase of one point in the percentage of professionals and technicians over the total population of working age.


**Table 7.** Gentrification and transnational gentrification. Source: Prepared by the authors with data from population and housing census 2001–2011, the Population Register and the National Statistics Institute (INE).

> In the case of Seville's historic center, the index is slightly below 2%, reflecting a smaller increase in this group. It should be noted that, for this period, the historic center of Seville is characterized as a very privileged sector compared to that of Cádiz, with more than half of the population employed in professional trades—a percentage that is less than a quarter in the case of Cádiz. Leaving aside the issue of the great internal diversity that exists in both historic centers, this could point to an earlier process of gentrification in the case of Seville, as the available literature indicates [33]. In the case of transnational gentrification, the opposite seems to be the case. It also has positive values. However, transnational gentrification this time is much higher in the case of the historic center of Seville, where it is 1.6%, corresponding to a notable increase in the percentage of foreigners from the most developed countries. In Cádiz, the figure is much lower and remains at 0.38%.

> The data in Table 7 add a certain nuance to the previous observations on population change in the two historic centers under study. The population that has promoted growth and rejuvenation during certain periods has been a socially privileged population, which would imply a degree of gentrification of the sector that is more noticeable during the study period in Cádiz, and even a degree of transnational gentrification that would be more significant in Seville.

## **4. Conclusions**

The high number of tourist dwellings and the difference in income between tourist housing and conventional rentals could be the main variable explaining the population losses in these historic centers in recent years. The impact of the growth of this type of tourist accommodation since 2012 is directly related to population losses, especially in Seville, thus reversing previous trends. On a statistical level, there is a relationship between socio-demographic and housing use structures and the distribution of tourist rentals, with the most explanatory variables being proximity to the center, housing uses and the presence of foreign population from countries with a high socio-economic level.

It has been possible to demonstrate that since 2013 there has been a loss of population in the historic centers of both cities that coincides with a clear irruption of digital tourist rental platforms, as already proposed by other authors such as Postma and Schmuecker, [5] and Veiga et al. [4], giving strength to the hypothesis that the high number of tourist homes and the difference in rent may be a reason for the process of touristification, as already indicated by Wachsmuth and Weisler [20].

At the same time, the high level of housing touristification in Seville coincides with a certain degree of transnational gentrification, which initially seems to be a logical relationship between the presence of foreign residents from wealthy countries and the supply of temporary accommodation for visitors from these same countries. In Seville, the phenomenon of touristification as the substitution of residents for visitors is clearer, but Cádiz has certain elements that make it more vulnerable. This is mainly due to the fact that its historic center is home to a population of lower status and with a greater share of tenants, which reduces its capacity to compete for residential space in the area and increases the risk of involuntary displacement.

The hypothesis of a link between touristification and population loss is strengthened by this work. However, in order to infer a cause-effect relationship between the increase in temporary tourist apartments and population losses, it would be necessary to have time series data on the former and to apply some kind of linear regression at a high level of disaggregation within historic centers, which could be a future line of work.

The relationship between gentrification and touristification is also a complex issue. From the outset, there seems to be a certain correlation between transnational gentrification and touristification. Nevertheless, in general terms, gentrification associated with the rejuvenation of historic city centers seems to precede and may even be negatively affected by the loss of residents, which affects young households as well as foreign households. Regarding whether or not this type of process is beneficial, although the main virtue of gentrification may have been the rejuvenation and reversal of the demographic decline of historic centers, the intensification of these dynamics related to touristification may be undermining these small gains. This is a point that needs to be further elaborated upon in the future development of this research.

**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, formal analysis, investigation, methodology, writing original graft, writing—review & editing, J.-J.P.; Conceptualization, formal analysis, investigation, methodology, supervision, I.D.-P. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research received no external funding.

**Institutional Review Board Statement:** Not applicable. The study does not include humans or animals.

**Informed Consent Statement:** Not applicable.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.
