From High-Priced Homes to Rentals: Where MKs Live

YERUSHALAYIM
A new apartment building complex in the southern Yerushalayim neighborhood of Gilo. (Lior Mizrahi/Flash90)
A new apartment building complex in the southern Yerushalayim neighborhood of Gilo. (Lior Mizrahi/Flash90)

As part of its attempts to be as transparent as possible, the Knesset requires MKs to divulge details of the properties registered in their names – and on Friday, the report was released, showing that while several MKs owned numerous properties, others were mere renters.

The real estate champs appear to be MKs Chaim Katz and Miki Zohar (Likud), who own five homes and apartments each. Also among the more prosperous is Zionist Camp MK Nachman Shai, who owns four properties, all in high-priced areas – his principal residence in Mevasseret Zion, as well as homes in Tel Aviv, Givatayim and one abroad. Also living in prime areas are Jewish Home head Naftali Bennett (Ra’anana) and Zionist Camp MK Erel Margalit (Yerushalayim), both of whom live in homes worth several million shekels.

Zionist Camp head Yitzchak Herzog owns only one – but it is in the ritzy Tzahala section of Tel Aviv, and is estimated to be worth NIS 7 million ($1.8 million). Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, owns two valuable properties himself – one in Yerushalayim and the other in Caesarea. Yesh Atid head Yair Lapid owns two homes in Ramat Aviv.

Shas head Rabbi Aryeh Deri,  has two properties – one in the Har Nof area of Yerushalayim, said to be worth NIS 5 million, and another in Safsufa, a town in the Galilee. Among United Torah Judaism MKs, Rabbi Moshe Gafni lives in a five room apartment on the third floor of a Bnei Brak apartment building, while Health Minister Rabbi Yaakov Litzman lives in a 2.5 room apartment in the Ezras Torah neighborhood in Yerushalayim.

Twelve MKs do not own any property at all. They include Gila Gamliel, Merav Ben Ari (who recently applied for an apartment in the government-subsidized Price Residence program), Oren Chazan (who lives with his parents in Ariel), Chilik Bar (he is set to purchase an apartment in the coming months), Orly Levy (who has a house under construction), Robert Elituv (ditto), and Michal Biran, Karine Elharar, Itzik Shmueli, Yoel Rezvozov, Amir Ohana, Eitan Broshi, Chaim Yellin and Tamar Zandberg, all of whom rent and have no current plans to buy or build.

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