The contradictions of market social housing in Brussels: social rental agencies between social mission and assetisation

Today’s rising housing prices in most countries worldwide have caused increasable attention to the problem of affordable housing. It is a social or ethical issue and an essential economic direction. Thus, affordable housing has great potential, influencing economic growth, labor forces, innovation, sustainable development, and an inclusive economy. Systematization of informational sources, theoretical and practical approaches for providing affordable housing, and assessing social housing needs indicated many views on this problem among scholars and policymakers. That is why marketing, management, and financial providing of affordable housing are significant mainstreams. The research aims to investigate marketing and management fundamentals of providing affordable housing in connection with funding aspects based on cross-country analysis. For achieving this target, key trends of housing market segmentation were analyzed, considering the distribution of the population by tenure status and analytical house price indicators using the data of the statistical office of the EU, the World Bank, and the OECD. The ways to promote more affordable housing by public and local authorities, private investors in affordable housing, and specific social and affordable housing market organizations were described. Main organizational forms of providing affordable and social housing were also characterized. Particular attention was paid to strategic planning for affordable and social housing, especially housing business plans or affordable housing strategy development as a priority step in marketing, management, and financial providing affordable housing. A SWOT analysis for affordable housing developments was used to show strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to the affordable housing market. To empirically confirm some relevant strengths, the impact of indicators of financial providing of affordable housing was formalized based on correlation analysis (calculating Pearson or Spearman correlation coefficients with time lags based on results of Shapiro-Wilk testing) and construction of Arellano–Bond linear dynamic panel-data regression model with checking the Sargan test of overidentifying restrictions (the sample from 25 EU countries for 2011–2019) using the Excel 2010 and STATA 14.2 software. The dynamic model made it possible to consider the share of affordable housing owners with mortgage or loan or the share of tenants, rent affordable housing at a reduced price or free. The value of GDP of the previous period affects the current situation (due to introducing lag variables and using instrumental variables or the generalized method of moments (GMM) to obtain adequate estimates). The hypothesis that an increase of 1% of the share of affordable housing owners with mortgage or loan causes the rise in GDP per capita of an average of 0.44% with a two-year time lag was empirically confirmed. An increase of 1% of the share of tenants, rent-free housing or affordable housing at the reduced price, causes the decrease of GDP per capita of an average of 0.5% with a two-year time lag. It was substantiated that governments should continue and improve their policies for financing social and affordable housing. At the same time, they should prefer affordable mortgage lending programs over programs of reduced or free rental housing. The results of this research confirm the significant drivers of policies and practices devoted to affordable and social housing, such as marketing, management, and financial providing. The presented recommendations are useful for scholars interested in this scientific field of research, public and local authorities, investors in affordable housing, and specific affordable and social housing organizations.

Public housing refers to housing that is built, purchased, or leased and supplied by a public housing business entity under the Special Act on Public Housing with financial support from the State or local governments or the Housing and Urban Fund. Public housing can be broadly divided into public rental housing and public sale housing. Public rental housing is divided into eight types: permanent rental housing, national rental housing, happy housing, and etc.. In addition, so-called public-private self-owned housing was introduced in 2021. Korea's public rental housing system has changed according to the policy regimes of governments on public rental housing, and with these changes, new types of public rental housing have been introduced and the supply of certain types of public rental housing has increased or decreased. And there were also changes in the name and legal basis of public rental housing. The integrated public rental housing type was introduced in 2020 to unify the various types of public rental housing and simplify the occupancy qualifications. Follow-up measures are needed for the establishment of the integrated public rental housing type. Meanwhile, there are doubts about the effectiveness of so-called public-private self-owned housing, such as accumulated equity housing unit for sale and profit-sharing housing unit for sale, introduced in 2021. And until now, public housing was supplied by the State and LH Corporation, but now there is an opinion that the social housing supplied by local governments and social economy entities should be revitalized. However, due to the nature of social housing, social economy entities will experience financial difficulties just like LH Corporation, and these difficulties will eventually be resolved only with the support of the State or local governments. However, such support for social economic entities would be a burden to the State or local governments, and therefore, social consensus on such support should be preceded. In addition, social conflicts are occurring due to the supply of public housing, and social mix policies are being attempted to solve this problem, but another type of social conflict is occurring as a result. Ultimately, social conflicts caused by public housing can only be resolved when there is a social consensus on the overall public housing policy.

This paper deals with bibliometric analysis and visualization of theory development of funding social housing considering connection of sociological and economic research. The main purpose of the research is to identify dominant trends in cross-sectoral research related to the development of the theory of funding social housing considering connection of sociological and economic research. Systematization literary sources and approaches for solving the problem of funding social housing indicates that the bibliometric analysis of scientific papers indexed in the Scopus database based on using VOSViewer software package and the Scopus scientometric database analysis were not applied enough in the scientific area of this research. Investigation of the topic about research activity in funding social, affordable, and public housing emphasizing the connection of sociological and economic patterns is carried out in the following logical sequence: introduction and proving the relevance of research problem; literature revue with generalization and analysis of scholars experience of bibliometric analysis and visualization in general and in funding social, public, and affordable housing in particular; the main part of investigation related directly to the Scopus scientometric database analysis and the bibliometric analysis of scientific papers indexed in the Scopus database based on using VOSViewer; conclusion of research. Methodological tools of the research methods were logical generalization and scientific abstraction, statistical and structural analysis, comparative, and graphical analysis using Excel 2010 software, Scopus database tools and VOSViewer software package v.1.6.16. The object of the Scopus database analysis was a sample of 5 385 scientific articles indexed in the Scopus scientometric database for the period from 1948 to 2020, and generated by the following keywords for search request: ‘funding social housing’, ‘financing social housing’, ‘social housing finance’, ‘funding affordable housing’, ‘financing affordable housing’, ‘affordable housing finance’, ‘funding public housing’, ‘financing public housing’, and ‘public housing finance’ (limit in 2020 is due to the availability of information on open portal of Scopus database and incomplete data for 2021). The top trends of theory development of funding social, affordable, and public housing were identified. The Scopus scientometric database analysis showed that the theory of funding social, affordable, and public housing is at the stage of formation and rapid development – about 60–70 % of the total number of publications for the period from 1948 to 2020 (for more than 70 years) were published in the last 10 years (and about 30–40 % – in the last 5 years). The total trend of number of articles dynamics about funding social, affordable, and public housing indexed in Scopus database in 1990-2020 was built. The accent was put on some significant increase peaks of publishing activity during investigated period connected with the economic and financial crisis in 2007, currency fluctuations, the COVID-19 crisis, etc. The structural and functional clustering of the development of the theory of funding social housing was carried out considering connection of sociological and economic research. The received conclusions can be useful for scholars in socioeconomics, public and private investors in social and affordable housing.

Rapid and deep changes in society, the economy and policy over the last decades are having an increasing impact on the delivery of social housing in North Western Europe. These changes are transforming the way in which social housing providers perform their task and are reshaping their relationships with the State, communities and with other market actors. The combination of continued State withdrawal from service provision, the deep and persistent effects of the global financial crisis that begun in 2008 and profound changes in the type of demand for social housing across North Western Europe call for a reflection on the implications of these phenomena for social housing providers. Several studies indicate that social housing providers in Europe have begun to adopt new (social) entrepreneurial strategies and are becoming more innovative as a response to these challenges. These strategies imply tackling the tensions between (at times) conflicting drivers, notably those arising from the State, the market and communities. However, research in this topic so far is fragmented, focussing on one country or on specific sub-areas such as asset management and non- housing activities and rarely connects with the relevant wider literature on the third sector and social enterprise. Within this context, this PhD research has sought to widen this discussion by providing new insights through a comparative study of the ways in which individual social housing providers are relating to (i.e. responding to and influencing) these contextual changes. More specifically, the research sought to better understand the complex process of decision-making these companies undergo to manage their responses to competing drivers. Companies operating in two countries (England and The Netherlands) were studied in-depth. In both countries, the social rental sector has played a prominent role in their respective welfare states for decades. While both are amongst countries with the highest share of social rental housing in Europe, each represents a different type of welfare state and of social housing provision - following Kemeny’s classification, a unitary system (the Netherlands) and a dualist system (England). The broad aim of this PhD was to deepen the understanding of the ways in which contextual drivers impact on the mission, values and activities of social housing organisations. Furthermore, the study sought to understand how these organisations are positioning themselves vis-à-vis the State, market and community. The above aims translate into three research questions: (1) How are contextual developments impacting on the missions, values and activities of social housing organisations? (2) How do these organisations position themselves vis-à-vis the State, the market and community? and (3) How are competing values enacted in the decision-making process exercised by these organisations vis-à-vis these contextual drivers? The universe for this PhD research consists of social purpose organisations, not owned by the State, which operate on a non-profit distribution basis. Together they are part of a wide range of ‘third sector’ actors providing social and affordable housing across most of North Western Europe. The PhD adopted a pluralistic epistemological approach with an interpretivist emphasis, with significant use of qualitative research methods. This approach was deemed useful to give a voice to the subject(s) of study. The research design included a mixed methods approach and a longitudinal, international and inter-organisational case study research design, involving two company-cases. The companies were studied over a four-year period, starting in March 2008. The research design and data analysis draws on elements of grounded theory, and on the work of Eisenhardt on ‘building theory from cases’. Following this approach, a series of ‘theoretical propositions’ were devised from the study’s findings in order to answer each of the three research questions. In relation to the first research question, the study found that contextual developments and the missions, values and activities of social housing organisations are in a two-way relationship. From an initial assumption of unidirectional causality, in the process of the research it became clear that the relationship between contextual developments and organisational change is more often than not one of mutual causality. We qualified this relationship through six propositions. First, we posited that market and State drivers have a relatively stronger impact on social housing organisations as compared to community drivers. Second, we postulated that both market and State drivers have a knock-on effect on community drivers. Third, we established that State drivers pose continuous exogenous shocks to social housing providers by means of constant policy changes. Our fourth proposition stated that in a context of economic crisis the relationship between market drivers and social housing organisations is marked by volatility. Our fifth proposition established that all three types of contextual drivers are reinforcing the long-term trend of deepening residualisation of the social housing sector. The sixth proposition emphasizes the long-term mutually shaping relationship between context and social housing organisations. Findings on the second research question led us to describe the positioning of social housing organisations vis-à-vis their environment as a ‘dynamic balancing act’. In order to understand the way(s) in which social housing organisations position themselves in relation to changes in their environment we drew on theories of social enterprise and hybridity to unpack three ideal-typical strategic orientations that may be at play in this process: State, market and community. We adopted a triangular model to illustrate these orientations and developed a classification model to understand the ‘strategic position’ that these organisations adopt vis-à-vis their environment. We looked at three different dimensions of this strategic position, namely mission, values and activities, each captured by a different type of variables in the classification: ‘descriptor’ (to capture the formal characteristics of the organisation), ‘motivator’ (as related to the organisation’s mission), and ‘behaviour’ (referring to the organisation’s activities). Upon applying this classification to our case studies, our findings resulted in three propositions. First, it became clear that while descriptor variables confirmed the hybrid formal characteristics of social housing organisations, they do not account on their own for their position in relation to State, market and community. Our second proposition stated that social housing organisations are constantly balancing pressures to (re)define their mission. Our study found that in this process, each company is faced with trade-offs when considering their organisational mission in relation to a changing mandate from the State domain, while at the same time weighing demands from the market and community domain. Third, we posited that social housing organisations exert different degrees of agency in their positioning vis-à-vis the State, market and community. We identified a continuum of actions that these organisations have put in place to respond to key contextual changes, ranging from ‘reactive’ to ‘proactive’ and ‘strategic’. Hence, social housing organisations would have the capacity to shape their environment and / or at least, their position in relation to this environment. On our third research question, we found that enacting competing values in social housing organisations implies multiple rationalities at play in decision-making. The PhD research used the study of a critical incident in each company to describe the ways in which competing values are enacted in the decision-making process of these organisations in relation to the three types of contextual drivers. In each case, a critical incident was chosen in conjunction with the companies to be studied over a prolonged period of time. Both incidents turned out to be of regulatory nature (i.e. State-driven); in the English case, it was the Comprehensive spending review (CSR) announced in October 2010 and a series of major welfare reforms implemented by the coalition government. In the Netherlands, the Dutch government ruling on the issue of State aid by housing associations implemented in January 2011. The companies’ responses to these critical incidents, respectively, were operationalised through a ‘strategic decision’ made by each of them vis-à-vis these events, defined as a decision recognised as having significant implications for the structure, direction or purpose of an organisation. The English company defined their strategic decision as the impact on the company’s vision, direction, strategy and financial capacity of the October CSR and the shake-up in the welfare benefit system. More specifically, the company’s bid to the HCA for the four-year development programme in the first half of 2011 formed the basis for the study of this critical incident. The strategic decision of the Dutch company was whether to follow the Dutch government’s ruling on income ceilings or not. Furthermore, the company had to decide how to re-organize its financing in order to comply with the required administrative split between activities classified as ‘Services of General Economic Interest’ (SGEI) and ‘non SGEI’. The study of these critical incidents looked at the decision-making process from both a formal and content perspective, distinguishing motivator and behaviour variables in the process. In terms of form, we found that different modes of decision-making co-exist in the process. Participants in each company use a variety of ‘political tactics’ to influence the decision-making process. Taken all together, the existence of these tactics confirms the presence of institutional entrepreneurial behaviour amongst company executives taking part in the process. Realizing that these tactics exist is important because it shows the ways in which different participants and their (departmental) agendas try to influence the outcome of the decision. In terms of content, a first proposition established that social housing organisations operate with multiple rationalities; non-rational factors such as politics, intuition and past experience played a key role alongside technical considerations. In our fourth proposition we identified a number of ‘dilemmas of hybridity’ that these organisations have to deal with to stay true to their mission while tackling pressures from different State, market and community. Second, we discussed the ambivalent relationship that social housing providers have with risk. A number of questions were raised on what (if any) risk attitude lies closer to third sector service providers in relation to what is expected from commercial enterprises or even from the State. This is relevant in particular given the more general trend to transfer risk from the State to third sector organisations in service provision overall in European societies. Last, our research found that social housing organisations are consistent with stated core values but are constantly making choices on how to enact these values. While contextual drivers may appear not to affect the mission and values of these social housing organisations, the former do impact on the companies’ strategies and activities. This means that there can be significant gaps between espoused and enacted values. Policy and practice implications emerging from the findings to all three research questions included: First, we raised the question as to whether the aggregate impact of the regulatory changes at sector level in each country - such as the ones portrayed by the respective critical incidents - would be the convergence of both countries’ housing association sectors in terms of their role and scope. Second, the study coincides with views in both countries pointing to the lack of a ‘single voice’ or unified strategic action fields. In addition, in both cases, although to different extents, the perceived ‘policy confusion’ – namely, the view that government was sending conflicting signals to social housing organisations - raised tensions between the redefined mandate and the organisational missions of the individual companies. Third, findings suggest a trend towards increasing differentiation within the housing association sector in each country as a result of growing tensions between mandate (social housing as a public service obligation as defined by the State) and mission (social housing as ‘core business’ as define by each organisation). Fourth, the question emerges as to whether the identity of a social housing provider operating along the wide spectrum between the two ‘pure’ types is defined by its activities (behaviour variables) or by their organisational form/legal status (descriptor variables). The concept of hybridity proved useful to gauge this complexity, as illustrated in the ‘dilemmas’ companies have to face when making strategic decisions. Fifth, findings showed that community drivers tend to stay constant or change slightly over the long term, except for those resulting from the combined impacts of the economic crisis and the resulting political and regulatory changes. This leads to the recommendation for social housing enterprises to consider longer-term political (and market) trends as well, to anticipate on going (neoliberal) trends and possibly fundamental changes in housing preferences. Sixth, while values tend to stay constant, mission is permanently redefined in relation to pressures from the environment (including changes in mandate) and activities change accordingly. In order to stay true to this identity, social housing providers ought to be able to anticipate conflicting logics and put mechanisms in place to adjust their policies and activities to respond to these challenges while keeping its core values intact. This PhD has contributed to science both from a theoretical and methodological perspective. Through a series of theoretical propositions, we have added to a developing body of knowledge, specifically on the nature of the relationship between contextual drivers and organisational changes in social housing organisations. Our classification of social enterprise in housing allows comparisons between organisations operating in diverse contexts, which share a similar core task. This can be useful for scientific, political and practical purposes. From a scientific perspective, it can be used as a basis for identifying similarities and differences between social housing organisations within and between countries at a much deeper level than traditional comparisons on the basis of tenure or other formal organisational characteristics. Policy makers can also use this information to understand the factors leading to different types of behaviours by social housing providers. For professionals, this model may be useful to assess to what extent their organisation is being consistent with regards to espoused vs. enacted values. From a societal perspective, findings of this PhD can help us reflect on the future role of social housing in the context of changing social contracts and social cohesion and welfare models in each country. Furthermore, the research helped participating practitioners to reflect about a number of organisational dilemmas they face, as illustrated in our findings.

Social Housing Organisations in England and The Netherlands: Between the State, Market and Community

Social Housing Organisations in England and The Netherlands: Between the State, Market and Community

Social Housing Organisations in England and The Netherlands: Between the State, Market and Community

References

Currently, there is a severe shortage of affordable rental and social housing to properly meet the needs of Australians. State governments, as the main suppliers of social housing, struggle to find the resources to provide the additional properties that are needed to address this shortage and private sector participation is also well below what is required. In order to improve conditions, on-going access issues to housing and associated support services need to be addressed. New and innovative approaches are required for both social housing for the most vulnerable and affordable housing for others in need. How to better address the social benefits of providing safe and secure housing whilst increasing supply and improving associated services through innovative procurement strategies requires further exploration to balance objectives along the housing supply chain. This SBEnrc research has considered the strengths and weaknesses of various social procurement approaches for social and affordable community rental housing in Australia against the backdrop of parallel research into changing demographics and housing typologies, and funding and financing models. From this, a set of social procurement criteria have been developed to assist those responsible for both policy development, and asset and service delivery with, for example, selecting among projects on the basis of their likely added social benefits.

In recent decades, institutional investment in rental housing has expanded into a wider range of localities and rental market segments, thereby further pushing the financialization of rental housing. As investment in single-family homes, multi-family apartments, student housing, (former) social housing, co-living, mobile homes, nursing and care homes, Built-to-Rent developments, and short-term rentals is increasing, niche asset classes are being mainstreamed into the capital flows of global real estate markets. However, there is little research that, on one hand, goes beyond ‘mature’ and ‘primary’ institutional markets where rental housing financialization has emerged under rather exceptional conditions (such as mass-privatization of social housing and severe consequences of the Global Financial Crisis), and on the other hand, attempts to gauge institutional investment across the rental market, including across niche asset classes. Through an in-depth case study of the Brussels Capital Region, we examine how and under which market and policy conditions institutional investment flows into an emerging institutional market where investment primarily takes places in niche asset classes. While recent studies have argued that institutional investment in rental housing is limited and, therefore, financialization still a marginal phenomenon, we argue that an in-depth market-wide analysis of institutional investment strategies is necessary for understanding how and to what extent rental housing financialization takes place. Finally, we argue that the patterns of emerging financialization we observe in Brussels may be applicable to other cities as well.

This paper summarizes the arguments and counterarguments within the scientific discussion on the issue of social housing, existing ethical dilemmas, and business development. The main purpose of the research is to investigate the interest level and popularity dynamics of social and affordable housing in the world in general and in OECD countries. The systematization of literary sources and approaches for solving the problem of ethical and economical aspects of social and affordable housing indicates that there is no single point of view on this issue among scientists. That is why the essence of the concepts of social, affordable, and public housing needs to be clarified considering existing differences. Besides it, comparative analysis of the results of analytical analysis of the interest level and popularity dynamics of social and affordable housing based on Google Trends tools and the results of statistical analysis in this context has not been conducted yet. Investigation of the topic about popularity dynamics of social and affordable housing emphasizing ethical needs and expected business benefits in the paper is carried out in the following logical sequence: systematization and clarification theoretical approaches to determine the essence and the difference between social, public and affordable housing; description of dominant types of funding social and affordable housing; analytical analysis of popularity dynamics of social and affordable housing with the determination of key value picks; statistical analysis of certain social housing indicators; comparing the results and making conclusions. Methodological tools of the research methods were logical generalization and scientific abstraction, statistical and structural analysis, comparative, and graphical analysis using the Excel software. Analytical analysis was realized based on Google Trends tools. The objects of research were the search requests about social, public, and affordable housing in the world in 2004-2021, and the indicators of social housing from the sample of OECD countries and other EU countries (limit in 2018 due to the availability of information on open information portals of The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development). The paper presents the results of analytical, statistical, and comparative analysis of the level of interest (popularity) and development of social and affordable housing. The recommendations according to the coexistence of ethical and entrepreneurial principles can be useful for public and private investors in social and affordable housing.

Rental housing has been regarded as the new ‘frontier for financialisation’ since the 2007 financial crisis. But research examining financialisation of de-commodified rental housing is limited and is primarily focused on stock acquisitions by financial investors and the enabling role of either national or local governments. This critically overlooks the emergence of the financialised production of social rented housing, the interplay between levels of government (particularly with the regional level), and the leading role of the state in these processes. By combining a political sociology approach to policy instruments with a housing system studies perspective, the paper investigates how Italy, through the interplay between national, regional (Lombardy) and local (Milan) governments, led the financialisation of its social rented housing production. Through analyses of six decades of financial-legislative changes in the housing system regarding production/provision, finance and land supply, it identifies a three-stage journey towards financialisation: (1) the rise and fall of publicly-owned rental social housing (1950s to 1990s); (2) the regionalisation and marketisation of the sector up to the late 2000s; and (3) the upward transfer from the first local-scale experiment with the real estate mutual investment fund in Milan to the creation of a national-scale System of Funds for the production of social rented housing. The study shows that the re-commodification of housing and land initiated in the 1980s were intertwined and a conditio-sine-qua-non for financialisation; that the state played a crafting—rather than solely enabling—role in this process; and that trans-scalar legislative–financial innovations transformed social rented housing into a liquid asset class.

Housing environments and asthma outcomes within population-based samples of adults and children in NYC

It is unclear what criteria turn housing into social housing. If government subsidy is the essential element, then all housing would have to be regarded as social — indeed, government support for home ownership being what it was, that tenure would presumably have a greater right to call itself social than (say) council housing. Housing Benefit provides a buoy for a number of private landlords enabling them to charge market rents. If the essential element is low-cost (either to build or to occupy), then those RSLs which charge more than private landlords would surely be excluded; indeed, that portion of the private rented sector provided by companies for their employees would be included. If the essential element was that it was not to make a profit, then those councils that supplement (or have supplemented) accounts other than their Housing Revenue Account, and some RSLs which guard their surpluses gained from rents, and pay large salaries and bonuses to their respective executives, would be hard-pressed to justify inclusion in the category of social housing (cf Priemus, 1997, p. 555: ‘This may be considered to be the crucial test: rented housing is defined as social rented housing when the landlord puts any surplus back into its property’). If the criterion was allocation according to need, the evidence suggests that ‘need’ is rarely as important as comparative bargaining power (see Clapham & Kintrea, 1991) or who is the most deserving (Cowan, 1997).

In the Northwestern European, especially in countries the Netherlands and Germany, social housing used to be a key element of the welfare state and urban planning, despite many differences in the way these two countries provided affordable housing. However, social housing and its role in welfare and urban issues have been changing. This chapter focuses on the changes in social housing initiated by policies of the European Commission (EC), the executive body of the European Union (EU), which unites 28 European countries. While the EU does not have the responsibility for housing policy, it nevertheless has influenced national housing markets by promoting competition between social and private landlords and developers in providing rental housing to residents. This chapter discusses how the EU legislation on creating fair competition between different types of rental housing providers has differentially impacted rental housing policies, with in Germany and the Netherlands as examples. The policies, which had a far greater impact on Dutch as compared to German social housing provision. We argue for a reexamination of the role of the EC, vis-a-vis the different national governments, in addressing growing housing affordability problems.