Tenant selection in the private rental sector of Paris and Geneva

Abstract

This article seeks to make sense of tenant selection in the private rental sector. It is based on 51 interviews with real estate agents in Paris (France) and Geneva (Switzerland). Tenant selection is a process whereby real-estate agents primarily assess whether prospective tenants can be a stable source of income for landlords. First, real estate agents use the income criterion as a category to organize the worthiness of a rental applicant. Our comparative design shows that financial risk assessment depends on particular institutional features of national tenancy regulations. Second, a “good tenant” is more than just a financially-solvent one. A good tenant pays rent regularly, stays in the apartment, maintains it in good condition, and does not cause any trouble. We show that real estate agents use many different categorical stereotypes related to these unobservable characteristics to dismiss applicants, just as employers on the low-wage labor market rely on stereotypes to identify soft skills of prospective employees.

KEYWORDS:

• Private rental sector (PRS)
• real estate agents
• tenant selection
• discrimination
• France
• Switzerland

Acknowledgments

Our empirical research was part of ANR-07-1210254 (DISCRI-SEGRE) with Etienne Lalé, Mirna Safi and Etienne Wasmer. We are deeply thankful to Lionel Akeret, Hugo Bertillot, Louise Bosetti, Vincent Canu, Mathilde Dedieu, Maxime Despont, Joséphine Goube, Ugo Palheta and Hervé Roquet for excellent research assistance. We are also grateful for the feedback on previous versions from Loïc Bonneval and Sidonie Naulin, and from the Housing Studies editors and anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 For instance, in June 2016, the rate of vacant housing was 0.81% in the canton of Vaud, 0.14% in the city of Lausanne, and around 0.45% in the canton and city of Geneva.

2 Landlords (who live in their apartments) make up a bit less than 50% of all households, and public housing renters 25% (Labrador and Trigano, 2015 ).

3 https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/fr/home/statistiques/construction-logement/logements/conditions-habitation/locataires-proprietaires.html, visited on 20/03/2019.

4 Beyond these formal requirements, several additional demands are added. They are often theoretically legally not admitted and vary according to agencies: a motivation letter, the contact details of the previous real estate agency and the employer, and a questionnaire about personal information — such as the reason for the move or whether the applicant plays a musical instrument.

5 The application usually consists of an identity document (such as passport or driving license), the last three payslips and a document from the employer indicating the date since employed, and a tax assessment notice. Some agencies ask for the contact details of the former landlord.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the ANR under Grant ANR-07-1210254, DISCRI-SEGRE.

Notes on contributors

Francois Bonnet

Francois Bonnet is Research Fellow at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS). He has published: The Upper Limit. How Low-Wage Work Defines Punishment and Welfare (University of California Press, 2019)

Julie Pollard

Julie Pollard is Senior Lecturer at the University of Lausanne (Switzerland). Her main topics of research are : housing policies and regulation, economic private actors in urban policies (i.e. real-estate developers, real-estate agents), urban services governance, comparative and qualitative approaches to urban policies and multi-level governance. Recent works include a book on real estate developers and housing policies in France : L’Etat, le promoteur et le maire : la fabrication des politiques du logement (Presses de Sciences Po, 2018).