Faced with the unlimited rise of the dwelling in Spain, the president of the Government, Pedro Sanchezannounced this Sunday its intention to create one to increase the public rental stock and stop the escalation. In Europe there are various initiatives underway to facilitate access to affordable rentals, with schemes similar to the one proposed by Sánchez. Below these lines, some examples from Italy, Austria, Germany, France and the United Kingdom.
In Italia There is no single centralized public company dedicated exclusively to promoting affordable rentals nationwide. However, they operate local companies or agencies that manage the public and social housing stock that each entity owns; in Milan, for example, there is the ALER (Azienda Lombarda per l’Edilizia Residenziale). Furthermore, the State offers direct aid through rental subsidies for families with economic difficulties.
This support, however, has been variable over the years and has been a source of recurring debate between the opposition and the various governments that have succeeded each other. The latest controversy arises from the recent decision of Giorgia Meloni’s Executive not to renew the financing of a fund created in 1993, through which, in 2022, 330 million euros were allocated in rental aid for vulnerable people. Despite this, other funds remain active.
The most successful, and centenary, Central European model is that of One. More than half of the population of the Austrian capital resides in publicly owned housingwhich are offered at affordable prices through a public company. To access one of these homes you do not have to meet special requirements, such as being a recipient of social assistance or having a low pension. Any citizen can request one of the 400,000 homes said to be cheap rentalswhich has turned into a cheapening of prices. They are not in the most monumental and tourist center of Vienna, but neither are they in the remote periphery and they are very well connected by the public transport network.
In Berlin There is a similar public company, Degewowhich in addition to purchasing housing, builds its own properties. It currently has about 75,000 units. But he has not been able to stop the speculation in a capital that, while it was divided by the wall and in the following decades, was an oasis compared to the skyrocketing prices of London, Paris or other German cities, such as Frankfurt, Munich or Hamburg.
The shortage of affordable housing is the first citizen concern in Germany. In 2021, upon reaching the chancellorship, Olaf Scholz created a new Ministry of Housing. Its objective was the construction of 400,000 new apartments per yearof which 100,000 were going to be social housing.
A special allocation of more than 18.1 billion euros was announced for this purpose to be distributed between the period from 2022 to 2027. But both in that first year and in 2023 it fell well short of the objective, since 25,00 and 33,000 units were built. respectively. All this, in the context of the decline in social housing registered in the last almost twenty years. If in 2006, the total number of social housing in Germany was 2.09 million homes, now the number has dropped to 1.05 million.
Like the rest of neighboring countries, access to housing in France It has become a problem for its citizens, and for years it has been one of the Government’s main battles. In 2007, the authorities merged the planning and construction offices and the public housing offices to create a single entity: the Public Housing Offices (OPH), a figure with powers similar to those pointed out by Sánchez for the Spanish public company.
This entity is responsible for managing social housing parks at the local and regional level but also builds and assigns housing with subsidized rents to people with low or moderate incomes. Over the years their work has gained importance and they already control more than half of the social housing in France.
According to figures published in 2015, the Federation groups 266 offices and manages more than 50% of the public housing portfoliothat is, about 2.4 million homes. Their job is not only to manage and facilitate access to these social housing, but also to study, design and update local strategies on social housing that allow the OPH to inform the competent ministry about the need to build more social housing.
The OPH also offers the possibility to families with moderate income buy this type of housing, as long as they comply with the habitability and health standards set in the decree. This type of homes for sale can be proposed by the public organization itself or at the request of the tenant willing to buy the social home in which they reside.
This organization is joined by other initiatives, such as rental aid (CAF) or specific fund programs, which facilitate access to housing for low-income families but also for young people or people with functional diversity. Still, according to the latest data from the Social Housing Union, there are currently 2.7 million people in France waiting to access social housing.
The construction of public housing in the United Kingdom It is carried out by the central government, local and regional administrations and housing associations. In the case of England, one of the main organizations in charge of the development and promotion of real estate is Homes Englanda public agency created with the objective of finance projects, supply buildable land and accelerate administrative procedures.
Among the programs promoted by Homes England is the so-called Shared Ownershipwhich allows first-time buyers to purchase a portion of a home (usually ranging between 25% and 75% of the total) and pay rent for the rest. The percentage of home ownership can increase over the years, until the final purchase is completed. Another program promoted by the public housing agency is the Affordable Housingwhich puts homes for rent at prices 50% to 80% lower than market values.
Between 2016 and 2023, just over 130,000 homes were built under these two programs, although non-profit organizations warn that 90,000 social homes are necessary each year to end waiting lists and stop the increase in housing. sinhogarism.
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