As a result of changes in housing policy in the 1990s, social landlords in the Netherlands operate largely independently from the government. Without direct financial support, with less government regulation and decreasing demand for social housing, they are adopting a market-oriented approach...

The social rented housing sector in Ireland comprises just 10 per cent of the national stock and most of this is managed by local authorities. This sector is highly residualized, with eight out of ten tenants being welfare-dependent and many estates being considered problem estates. This article...

The size of the Dutch social housing sector, with a 32 per cent share of the housing stock, has prompted concerns over the 'level playing field' of competition between social and commercial housing providers. In 2007, this concern culminated in a complaint from the Dutch Association of...

Encouraging home ownership is an important aim of housing policy in many countries. It is supposed to have positive effects on individual households and on society as a whole. This article focuses on the effect of home ownership on former tenants of social rented housing in the Netherlands. The...

Some of the problems associated with large housing estates in Western Europe are emerging in Slovenia. Others, such as vacancies and high turnover, have yet to become significant problems in Slovenia. Moreover, the problems arising from poor construction are far less prevalent in Slovenia than...

The broad trajectory of housing policy since the 1980s has been to reject the paternalism and bureaucracy of traditional local authority landlords and to encourage voluntary sector housing providers. The rationale for these strategies has been to use a diversity of landlords (to create synergy...

In the past ten to 20 years, governments in various countries have introduced or reinforced market principles in their housing systems. As a consequence, social landlords should have increased opportunities to adopt a more market-oriented approach towards the management of their housing stock....

In the Netherlands 95 per cent of all rents are regulated. The Housing Minister announced in her Rental Letter of November 2004 that this would be reduced to 75 per cent. At the same time she wants the housing associations to contribute €250 million a year to the increasing public expenditure...

The new European Reform Treaty, which was agreed politically in 2007, includes a separate protocol which allows European member states considerable freedom to organize and run their social amenities - including social housing. It appears that housing associations are eligible for state support,...

Recently, the Netherlands has been pursuing a new policy of urban renewal. Old urban renewal concentrated on pre-war urban districts and had a technical orientation. The predominant shift in tenure was from commercial to social rented housing. New urban renewal focuses on post-war urban...