Geneva housing crisis to persist despite international funding cuts

Housing: no "strong" effect linked to international Geneva Keystone-SDA

The director of the Swiss Federal Housing Office (FHO), Martin Tschirren, does not expect the thousands of redundancies in international Geneva to have a major impact on housing in Geneva. “Demand will still far outstrip supply,” he said on Wednesday in Geneva.

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“The federal administration is keeping a very close eye on what is happening in Geneva and in international Geneva,” he told the press on the sidelines of a ministerial meeting of the UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), which he chairs. Thousands of employees of international organisations have lost their jobs as a result of funding cuts by the US and several other countries.

But this situation will not solve the housing crisis in Geneva. “I don’t think it will affect the market very much,” insists Tschirren. “Demand is so high that, even if fewer people are looking for accommodation in the region, the pressure will be eased somewhat, but it will far outstrip supply,” he says.

Nor does the director of the FHO want to speculate on the impact of the abolition of rental values, which has been approved by the Swiss people. “Time will tell” whether investment in adapting housing to climate change will decline, he says.

Tschirren and his counterparts from the UNECE, which brings together European countries and some states from the North American continent and Central Asia, are due to approve commitments for more affordable and sustainable housing. “Almost all countries are facing a shortage” in their housing stock, explained Tschirren. In Switzerland, the vacancy rate is historically low at 1%, and a plan was approved last year to deal with this situation.

Low rate of home ownership

Commitments under the UNECE are to focus on the most vulnerable, finance affordable housing through property taxes, and invest in public and social housing. The governments also say they are in favour of innovative financing mechanisms such as green bonds and sustainability loans. “We’ll only be able to see in a few years’ time whether these commitments have made a difference,” said Tschirren.

According to a recent UNECE study based on figures from 2020, Switzerland has the lowest rate of home ownership among some thirty countries, at 38.9%. This is a far cry from the European average of almost two-thirds.

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Switzerland is also the 8th worst country in terms of the financial burden of housing, with more than 26% of income going to this budget item. For people below the poverty line, it is the second best, with less than a quarter, just behind Finland.

In Europe, more than a third of less well-off households have difficulty financing their housing. The figure rises to 38% in Switzerland. Several countries have established support policies such as subsidised housing or aid for green housing.

Translated from French by DeepL/jdp

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