Housing Investment Trusts: A New Structure of Rental Housing Provision?

Recent governments in Britain have sought to attract financial institutions into private rental housing in order to increase the scale, professionalism and reputation of the sector and thereby to 'modernise' private landlordism. In 1996, in order to provide an attractive vehicle for the financial institutions to invest in the sector, the government introduced legislation permitting the establishment of housing investment trusts. These residential property companies have a reduced tax liability compared with normal property companies. However, no housing investment trusts have so far been established and none seem likely to be set up. This paper reports on qualitative interviews with financial institutions to examine why housing investment trusts have proved to be a policy failure. It is argued that the rules governing such trusts did not reflect the normal operations of a property company and that the existing structure of housing provision in the private rented sector was itself an obstacle to the modernisation of private landlordism.     

The Effect of EU-Legislation on Rental Systems in Sweden and the Netherlands

Both Sweden and the Netherlands had housing systems that include broad models of municipal housing (Sweden) or social housing (Netherlands). These broad models, however, came under discussion due to the competition policy of the European Commission. Financial government support – state aid – for public or social housing is considered to create false competition with commercial landlords. The countries chose different ways out of this problem. The Netherlands choose to direct state aid to a specified target group and had to introduce income limits for dwellings owned by housing associations. Sweden instead chose to change the law regulating municipal housing companies and demands that these companies should act in a ‘businesslike way’ and with that aims to create a level playing field. This paper will describe why the two countries chose different options, the development during the first years, and also speculate about the consequences on the longer run and the future role of the public/social housing sector in housing and urban policy.     

瑞士住宅的当今主题

个性化的需要 瑞士是一个以租用居所著称的国家。不到三分之一的人口有自己的房子。而在城市里，也只是一小部分人拥有自己的住宅。因而多层住宅形成了广泛的基础类住宅。很长时间以来一直如此。绝大多数出租公寓的主人都是个人。只有在有卫星城的大都市里，住宅协会，退休基金组织和在股票交易所上市的财团企业才有可能提供大量的住房。     

Dutch Housing Associations: Current Developments and Debates

In the Netherlands, social housing accounts for 37 per cent of the total stock, and as much as 75 per cent of the total rented stock. For observers from outside the Netherlands this seems an anachronism. The dominant institution within the Dutch social rented sector is the housing association: a private organisation, functioning within the public framework of the Housing Act. This paper puts forward an explanation of why the Netherlands' social housing sector is so large. An overview is provided of the social housing institutions at sector level, their effectiveness is evaluated, and questions on the efficiency of the housing associations are posed. Several variants for the future status of housing associations are assessed and the political choice made in 2000 by the Netherlands government is elucidated. Finally, there is a discussion about the recent proposals encouraging housing associations to opt out of the public system and some recommendations are formulated for the Dutch social housing sector. It is possible that these could provide a source of inspiration for housing politicians elsewhere in Europe.     

British home owners and housing change in rural France

Drawing on a survey of 406 home owners in France, expansion in British property ownership is shown to have increased the rural housing stock and to have improved rural housing quality. In all, 30 per cent of British home owners in France have added at least one dwelling to the housing stock, mostly by restoring a derelict property or bringing an unwanted farm building into residential use. Amongst other property owners, 55 per cent have undertaken significant renovations (extensions, major structural work, etc.), so more than two‐thirds of all British buyers have helped raise the quality of the rural housing stock. This has had little effect on house prices, partly because there is little French demand for the properties Britons buy. Given that British buyers are also reluctant to acquire homes from other Britons, a semi‐autonomous housing market is being created in which resales are difficult. This tendency is weakening slightly now, but British owners who wish to sell continue to rely on France being used as an extension of ‘British’ rural housing markets, wherein they can acquire a rural ‘dream’ home that is not only unaffordable but also unattainable in Britain.     

Promoting home ownership in a social‐rented city: policies,practices and pitfalls

Amsterdam's housing market is dominated by the social‐rented sector. It comprises 56 per cent of the total housing stock, while home ownership comprises only 19 per cent, lower than anywhere else in the Netherlands, and among the lowest in the world. Central government policy is currently seeking to increase the share of home ownership in the Netherlands from 53 per cent (2001) to 65 per cent in 2010. This paper will summarise recent national and local (Amsterdam) housing policy developments, focusing on the recent practice of selling social housing in Amsterdam. Unlike the Right to Buy scheme in Britain, the Netherlands employs an ‘offer to buy’ strategy. Sales, however, have been disappointing so far. Two factors were found to be crucial in this regard: (1) the sluggish change in ‘policy mentality’ and bureaucracy and (2) the high prices in the home ownership market. By way of conclusion, the paper reflects on the desirability of shifting the tenure structure from tenancy to ownership and on the risks that an (over‐) emphasis on home ownership may bring.     

Portfolio Management in the Social Rented Sector: Valuation,Risk Analysis and Strategy Development

The financial aspects of social housing management are becoming more important for housing associations in Western Europe, due to changes in their economic and institutional context. As part of a trend towards the privatisation and decentralisation of public services, housing associations are becoming more self-reliant. Government financial support is decreasing and parts of the housing market are changing in response to low demand. To ensure that housing associations run an economic, efficient and financially sound business, knowledge of the financial performance of their stock is becoming more important for their investment policy. In the Netherlands, these general changes in housing policy, management and market have been a prominent feature of the last decade, and have resulted in a variety of responses under the general heading of asset and portfolio management. This paper describes methods for valuation, risk analysis and portfolio management for housing associations. The paper sets out the context within which Dutch housing associations operate. Existing methods for valuation and risk analysis are evaluated for their applicability to social landlords. These methods are placed within the business planning process to show how the methods can be used to inform asset management strategy. Finally the paper reflects on the implications for practice in social housing management.     

POLICY REVIEW The Impact of Housing Policy Changes on Housing Associations: Experiences in the Netherlands

For decades, housing associations in the Netherlands were the country's landlords of social rented housing par excellence. Presently housing associations own and administer over 90 per cent of the social rented stock, which now comprises 37 per cent of the total Dutch housing stock. The changes in Dutch housing policy which were made from 1993 onwards, have also changed the role and position of the housing associations. The financial ties binding the social housing sector and the national government have largely been dissolved. Responsibility for adequate housing was decentralised from the central government to the local authorities. Municipalities and housing associations have developed a new tradition of performance agreements on local housing policy. This paper reviews the response of housing associations to the circumstances created by the new housing policy of the 1990s.     

The Geography of an EthniCity: Residential Segregation of Birthplace and Language Groups in Sydney, 1996

Many contemporary cities have a diverse ethnic-cultural mix as a result of different international migration streams, with implications for the residential distribution of various ethnic groups within those cities. Boal recently suggested a series of scenarios against which the pattern in any one place could be evaluated. These are applied to Sydney in 1996, when over 34 per cent of the residents reported a birthplace outside Australia and 30 per cent reported using a language other than English at home. Lacking data on ethnic status, the birthplace and language data are used to explore Sydney's residential geography at two spatial scales, and to identify the degree of residential segregation of each birthplace and language group. Regression analysis, used to assess the relevance of human capital to observed levels of segregation, suggests that Boal's assimilation scenario accounts for most of the observed geographies, with some additional pluralism but little evidence of polarisation. These results suggest that the dynamics of Sydney's housing market facilitate movement into most areas of demand, subject only to labour market constraints; differential access to sections of the labour market, and hence to housing market sections, is a major factor in the residential segregation of birthplace and language groups in Sydney.     

Housing-bubble vulnerability and diversification opportunities during housing boom–bust cycles: evidence from decomposition of asset price returns

This paper examines the implications of housing-bubble vulnerability and time-varying risk management extracted from permanent–transitory ratios of asset price returns, which measure the relative importance of permanent and transitory shocks to asset markets. We extend the unobserved components model, which divides asset price returns into permanent and transitory components, to investigate the interrelations across housing assets, real estate investment trusts (REITs), and stocks in the USA. After 1984, which is the estimated break point in cross-asset interactions, many metropolitan statistical area-level housing markets display vulnerability to housing bubbles due to high permanent–transitory ratios, which suggests weak monetary policy effectiveness in stabilizing the housing boom–bust cycles. Households can diversify long-run risks by establishing stock–housing and REIT–stock portfolios after 1984, but they have fewer diversification opportunities in the post-1984 subperiod than in the pre-1984 subperiod.     

Happy Returns: The Individual Investor as a Source of New Capital for Rented Housing in a Time of Changing Social Welfare Structures

Recent changes in the ideology of welfare have led to reductions in the scope for some individuals to play their desired part in funding the social welfare system through taxation. At the same time, there is a widely held view in the housing world that over the next 20 years the supply of rented homes is going to be too low to meet rising demand. Prospects for significantly increased public investment in new rented housing look slight. Private finance is now seen by government as the preferred source of capital funds for the creation of extra housing, not only in the private rented sector but also in the housing association sector, and perhaps in future in the local authority sector. However, the financial institutions-the most often quoted source of private finance currently appear reluctant to take on this role, at least in the privately rented sector. Presently, little attention is being given to the individual, as opposed to the institutional, investor. This paper-based on evidence gathered in a national survey of individual shareholders in companies listed on the London Stock Exchange-explores the possibility of individuals becoming more involved in investing capital in rented housing, both private and public. It suggests that there is some interest in such investment among current shareholders who have considerable assets. More specifically, it argues that there is a group of ethical investors who would be willing to invest in rented housing, some of whom may be willing to accept a lower rate of return on rented housing than on competing investments. Together these groups (and other 'socially disenfranchised' citizens) may offer a source of considerable capital to complement that which institutional investors may provide. If such capital is to be forthcoming, policies are required which address their requirements. A number of suggestions are put forward.     

Rural Housing Consumption and Social Stratification in Transitional China: Evidence from a National Survey

Safe and affordable housing is accepted as a basic right in the modern world. Studies on transitional societies have demonstrated how politicized the housing market can become and how housing consumption is determined by both economic forces and public rules. Rural housing in China offers a unique institutional environment. While residential land is collectively owned and allocated, villagers have the freedom to make decisions with regard to construction space. Drawing on a large national survey, this paper provides the first systematic analysis of the consequences of these different institutional rules. In terms of housing resources, residential land is distributed in a relatively equitable fashion, but the building of structures on that land is defined by a higher degree of social stratification. These findings extend the current literature and confirm the power of institutional rules in housing consumption.     

Suburban Housing Resale Prices and Housing Market Restructuring

This study shows that in the suburban rings surrounding Cleveland, Ohio average resale prices are sustained through capitalization of quality–price preferences for housing and school quality. Average housing resale prices are highest where local fiscal capacity is built upon a strong residential–nonresidential property tax base and where the total valuation resulting is capitalized into housing stock prices. High total valuation per pupil enables school districts to maintain satisfactory per pupil expenditures that contribute to the sustainability of resale prices. Nonetheless, regional restructuring, population growth, access to superior housing, open space and other amenities in the peripheral, inner– and outer–edge suburban rings are redirecting investment away from the contiguous ring suburbs where the levying of high effective millages is causing total valuations per pupil to fall. Diminishing school district quality and shrinking tax bases in the contiguous suburbs are harbingers of suburban distress and housing disinvestment.     

Matching housing supply and demand: an empirical study of Hong Kong's market

This paper has the objective of improving on the issue of forecasting new housing construction, and highlights differences between space demand and investment demand in housing markets. Further, it indicates how these differences will affect construction decisions. The first step is to identify the factors associated with estimating residential property prices in Hong Kong, based on a demand-supply adjustment process. Specifically, this study examines the role of population growth, transaction volume, inflation and interest rate in determining house prices. Second, based on these estimations, a methodology is developed to estimate the investment demand schedule and new construction of residential property.     

Subway capitalization effect in Beijing: Theory and evidence on the variation of the subway proximity premium

This paper analyses the relationship between community attributes and the subway home‐price capitalization effect, asking whether the magnitude of the subway proximity premium is affected by neighbourhood economic status and location. Using longitudinal data from Beijing, the paper estimates that decreasing a community's distance to a subway station by 10 per cent increases the housing price per square metre by 0.2 per cent ~ 0.9 per cent. The paper also shows that, subway capitalization effect is around 0.1 per cent ~ 0.2 per cent lower for communities that have higher quality and charge a 1 Yuan higher property management fee. Moreover, the analysis also reveals that the subway capitalization will decrease by around 0.08 per cent as a community's distance to the central business district (CBD) increases by 1 km.     

NONPROFIT HOUSING ORGANIZATIONS AND INSTITUTIONAL SUPPORT: The Management Challenge

ABSTRACT: The viability of the low income housing built by nonprofit organizations in US cities hinges on the ability of these groups to maintain and manage it. Nonprofit sponsors and their institutional support system have only recently begun to recognize the importance of property and asset management. First priority continues to be housing production, followed by organizational capacity building. This paper explores how the institutional support network for nonprofit housing has begun to address the need for stronger property management. Drawing from recent six city study, the authors examine different ways by which local and national networks provide financial and technical support for property management. They conclude with a series of recommendations for broadening and strengthening institutional support for property management in the nonprofit sector.     

Local Planners and Limits on Local Residential Development

A survey of local planning officials in Southern California found that decision-making processes affect local residential development policy, despite prevailing views that local political forces are largely irrelevant. While most studies of local development policy rely on easily available, published measures of socioeconomic and institutional variables, this study used a comparative analysis of local governments. The results indicate that survey-based measures of local officials' attitudes and perceptions can account for variations in restrictions on local residential development, even after adjusting for the effects of socioeconomic characteristics.     

Housing affordability in Shenzhen special economic zone: A forerunner of China's housing reform

This paper aims to examine and draw national implications from the affordability issues of the housing reforms in Shenzhen Special Economic Zone. It was found that since the reforms, housing was still well within the affordability limit of the end‐users, but availability was a problem for the non‐government employees. The Shenzhen experience inferred that the 15 per cent rent‐income ratio targeted for China's urban sector by the year 2000 might be appropriate. A target price‐income ratio of three for the lower‐ and middle‐income household also seemed plausible, but the market pricing principle for high‐income families was cautioned in the paper. It was found that the non‐government work units faced the greatest affordability problem in providing housing for their employees because of the need to purchase housing at market prices. The government had less affordability problems after the reforms because it could reduce spending on housing and recoup some of its past investment through the sale of housing. Moreover, as a result of the reforms it received an additional levy from the development companies.     

How Race and Class Stereotyping Shapes Attitudes Toward Affordable Housing

The development of affordable housing often involves a contentious siting process. Proposed housing developments frequently trigger concern among neighbors and community groups about potential negative impacts on neighborhood quality of life and property values. Advocates, developers, and researchers have long suspected that these concerns stem in part from racial or class prejudice. Yet, to date, empirical evidence supporting these assumptions is lacking. This study seeks to examine roles that perceptions of race and class play in shaping opinions that underlie public opposition to affordable housing. This study applies a public opinion survey to determine the extent to which stereotypes and perceptions of the poor and minorities relate to attitudes toward affordable housing. The results demonstrate that such perceptions are particularly strong determinants of negative attitudes about affordable housing. These findings provide advocates, planners, developers, and researchers with a more accurate portrayal of affordable housing opposition, thereby allowing the response to be shaped in a more appropriate manner.     

Assessment of barriers to public rental housing exits: Evidence from tenants in Beijing,China

Public rental housing (PRH) exits exert a profound influence on turnover rates, which further impact the public housing principles of fairness and efficiency. However, very few studies have attempted to investigate the tenant's barriers to exit PRH units in Chinese studies. In this paper, using data drawn from a randomly sampled survey of tenants in Beijing during the March 2017, we employ structural equation modeling (SEM) to examine the factors influencing tenant's barriers to exit. We find that housing availability is the most influential factor in determining the tenant's barriers to leave PRH, and residential satisfaction is also considered as a motivation against PRH exits. In addition, residential satisfaction transfers the impact of tenant's perceptions of housing and neighborhood to exit barriers. Especially, the effects of housing availability on exit barriers are higher in some groups, such as elderly, high income households, large-sized families and respondents with long spell of residence. Any program aimed at getting tenants to leave public housing sector needs to reduce their barriers to access to the private rental market and take into consideration the various characteristics of the tenants.