Contrasting housing microfinance with the social production of habitat in the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina

Abstract

In a context of the state withdrawing from housing provision, despite a persistent shortage of affordable housing, housing policies in Buenos Aires, Argentina, have increasingly diversified. This paper contrasts two different credit-based approaches to low-income housing provision which have been implemented since the year 2000 in the City of Buenos Aires: collective mortgage loans for self-managed housing construction and improvement projects, embedded in a logic of ‘social production of habitat’; and individual housing microloans, following a logic of financial inclusion for low-income households. We examine a case study of each approach and contrast the institutional shifts that have taken place during their implementation, the learning processes each approach facilitates for participants, and the details of how housing is produced in each approach. We conclude that, although housing microfinance and the social production of habitat may appear to follow contradictory logics, they can also be treated as complementary solutions that could be combined to address each other’s shortcomings.