Over 2 years ago Mayor of Jerualem Nir Barkat was looking for a solution to the issue of the ghost towns of Jerusalem. Some neighborhoods have many apartments that sit empty, as the homeowners live abroad and use these homes as vacation homes. At the same time, they choose not to rent out their apartments. This takes many apartments off the market, which causes rental prices to increase, making it difficult for young people and students to find affordable housing.

Barkat was coming up with suggestions for ways that would entice such homeowners in Jerusalem to rent out their empty apartments and make them useful instead of sitting empty.

Yesterday, Minister of Interior Gideon Saar, who seems to be working during his week of sheva brachos, signed on to an executive order that would charge double arnona from homeowners of apartments and homes that remain unoccupied. I think this was one of the ideas originally proposed by Barkat, but either way it is now in effect. The order must be approved by the Finance Minister (Yair Lapid), but that is not expected to be a problem.

I have not seen any explanation of how long the home must be unoccupied in order to be considered unoccupied for this purpose. An additional clause is that homeowners living in Israel, who own only one apartment/home but do not live there for whatever reason, will not be charged this increased rate. Only homeowners living abroad who leave their local homes unoccupied along with Israeli homeowners who own more than one apartment and leave them unoccupied, will pay this increased arnona rate..

(sources: Ynet, INN)