Mexico City and the State of Mexico account for 31.1% of the 44,343 housing seizure cases opened nationwide from January 2025 to June 2026, according to figures from the Executive Secretariat of the National Public Security System (SESNSP) published by Expansión Política on Monday, August 17.
Housing seizure occurs when an individual or group takes possession of a property that does not belong to them, with or without violence, and it affects primarily the assets of families and elderly persons. The State of Mexico leads the national registry with 8,043 investigation files, followed by the capital with 5,763, according to the same report. The problem is longstanding: between 3,500 and 4,000 cases are reported annually in the capital for at least the past 15 years, noted Rodrigo Meneses Reyes, researcher at CIDE. Many of the affected properties have long ownership histories, with titles that were never formally registered after an inheritance or a relocation, leaving families with few tools to recover them.
The boroughs and municipalities with the highest number of complaints are Iztapalapa, Ecatepec, Cuauhtémoc, and Gustavo A. Madero. The case of Tonalá 351, in Roma Sur, illustrates the challenge: of 15 apartments seized since May 2025, eight remain occupied, said Norma Reyes, the building's administrator. Impunity is the defining feature of the crisis: only 7% of national cases end in an arrest and just 1% result in a conviction, while in the capital only 2% of seized properties are returned to their owners after legal proceedings, according to data cited by Expansión. In the capital, ten neighborhoods have concentrated the critical hotspots since 2016, with the Historic Center leading with 705 investigation files, according to the Attorney General's Office of Mexico City.
Mexico City's Attorney General's Office is investigating the alleged involvement of at least 10 public servants in seizure cases, coordinating a working group with its Internal Affairs Unit, and will consolidate its findings in a report, La Jornada reported. The next monthly SESNSP report will update the metropolitan area's seizure figures.
This article was drafted with artificial intelligence assistance from verified sources and reviewed by a human editor before publication.