The study confirms the heterogeneous nature of housing in the Walloon Region as well as an increase in existing differences. It highlights the existence of local basins of differentiated housing and income, of differentiated housing needs, of various active local markets, and of a badly distributed offer of new housing possibilities.
A rough typology relates income distribution and real estate prices. Taking new needs into account means that housing policy has to be tuned to demographic changes and transformations in standards of living. For instance, an analysis of housing possibilities points to an increase in the number of large private houses while the number of small households rises, which is likely to result in severe inadequacies. The current housing offer is dominated by larger units (over 50 % of the 80,000 dwelling units that were built between 1991 and 1998) while the increase in smaller dwellings is still limited (2,5 %).
Since the end of the 19th century most households have bought a dwelling of their own. This is one reason why there are relatively few tenants in the Walloon Region. Becoming a home owner is still perceived as a most desirable achievement, which raises problems since this social objective was set up at a time when economic circumstances were exceptionally favourable. Nowadays fewer workers can rely on a stable income, family cycles are different, there are more small households, etc. It is therefore advisable to develop social guidance for housing issues which would help households define their specific needs.
The report also examines the housing needs in the Borinage (a socially deprived former mining area in the South of Belgium). It highlights the local economic structure, structural forms of precariousness in the district, and consequences on types of mobility and on housing possibilities.

 The right to decent housing was inscribed into the Housing Code in the Walloon Region and is one of the constitutional economic, social and cultural rights. It thus fully belongs to the objectives of the Walloon social policies. A new dimension concerning how housing is developed was added to the former housing policy. It corresponds to the need for sustainable land-use planning advocated by the Schéma de Développement de l’Espace Régional (SDER). Concretely this involves a more transversal approach to land planning, and the integration of housing in a larger context for both reflection and action.
Such new directions make it necessary for decision-makers to rely on operational knowledge and to have instruments for assessment and anticipation at their disposal.

Our research was based on five priority approaches:
- foresight analysis based on a quantitative estimate of (1) housing possibilities in the Walloon Region, and recent development in this respect, (2) the current structure of households and the evolution of the Walloon population;
- dynamic analysis of real estate offer based on newspaper ads;
- analysis of the impact developments on the housing market has on households in a financially precarious situation, and of how public authorities can remedy the problem;
- theoretical approach to the notions of housing and land-use planning on the basis of case studies;
- analysis of the housing behaviour of households (migrations and mobility).

The several approaches combined in our project made it possible to define some suggestions on which public authorities could act. Results show how necessary it is to gear housing policies to reach three objectives, namely a territorial objective, a categorial objective, and a sectorial objective.
The first objective aims at better accounting for specific features of territories and thus reducing disparities and more adequately meeting local needs. This can be done through a planning approach that uses as little land as possible.
The categorial objective aims both to help the most marginalised groups of people that the market cannot provide for, and to meet new needs in terms of housing. The solution here consists of matching demographic features of households with housing possibilities. Such correlation provides public authorities with useful data for future action.
The third sectorial objective aims at developing policies that would not be geared only to the needs of some segments of the market. Social guidance to housing would make it easier to define the needs of households and thus to meet their expectations.

Conférence Permanente du Développement Territorial (CPDT), Région Wallonne.
http://cpdt.wallonie.be
Mss. Françoise Noël, tel. +32 2 650 34 74

//

//2000

LEPUR-ULg (LEMA) : P. Mathus, V. Olivier (under the direction of Prof. Albert Dupagne); CREAT – UCL : Duyck X., Goffin E., Hagelstein R. (under the direction of Prof. P. Govaerts); GUIDE Free University Brussels: J. Dawance, D. Istaz, D. Jamar, B. Zitouni (under the direction of Prof. F. Noël).

research

Urban Policy > Housing

Housing policy