The benefits of living in a social housing dwelling: effects on living standard and accommodation conditions

This article provides evidence about how access to social housing affects living and accommodation conditions of households, using hedonic prices and stratified regression methods. First, I estimate the monthly monetary benefit of social housing tenants, which is the difference between the actual rent of a social housing dwelling and the potential value of a similar dwelling on the private rental market. This monthly implicit benefit amounts in 2006 to 261 euro each month and can be broken down into two parts: a living standard effect of 227 euro, e.g. an increase in household consumption of other goods and savings, and a 34 euro rise in the value of the home. More precisely, I compare the accommodation conditions of social housing tenants to the counterfactual accommodation conditions of the same households in a privately rented home without access to social housing. I obtain that when a household move to a social housing home, it lives in a larger dwelling, but in a poorer neighbourhood. Finally, access to social housing does not generate housing over-consumption.