Social housing in Flanders: best value for society from social housing associations or social rental agencies?

Abstract

Social housing in Flanders is provided by two types of organizations. Social Housing Associations (SHAs) build and buy houses. Social Rental Agencies (SRAs) rent houses on the private market. Both types of organizations have a similar goal: to provide affordable and good quality housing to households in need. In this article, we describe the SHA and SRA model, assess the cost for the government of both models and evaluate their cost-effectiveness, which we define as the value for society (the outcome) given the government budget. The conclusion is that an SRA dwelling in Flanders on average has a higher cost to the government than an SHA dwelling. With respect to outcomes, we find some are better for SHAs and other are better for SRAs. The main contribution of this article is that it proposes a methodology for assessing the cost and the cost-effectiveness of different models of social housing, which can also be applied in other institutional contexts.