Non-profit housing, a tool for metropolitan cohesion? The case of the Vienna–Bratislava region

Abstract

Non-profit housing has a long history both in Austria and in Slovakia, even if recent socio-economic and political transformations question this model born in the nineteenth century. This type of housing is considered as affordable housing according to a generalist conception in Austria and a residual one in Slovakia. But in spite of divergences in their national housing policies, both countries are facing common challenges which are epitomised in the Vienna–Bratislava region. This article analyses the role of non-profit housing in bringing more cohesion to a growing but fragmented metropolitan region.

Keywords:

• non-profit housing
• Austria
• Slovakia
• metropolisation
• cohesion
• centre-periphery model

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank the reviewers of this article for their constructive comments and is very grateful to Anne-Kathrin Marquardt for assistance on the English-language checks.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. No data per destination country available: ‘Based on the statistics, nor Austrian, nor Hungarian, nor Slovak gives the data on the commuting from the suburban areas of Bratislava located in neighboring countries’(ESPON 2012).

2. Other municipalities of the Bratislava Region were not taken into account in this sample since local mayors are responsible for the construction of non-profit housing, but non-profit housing associations are not.

3. Inner districts of Vienna were not considered in the sample since there is no construction of affordable housing by non-profit developers there, due to very high land prices.

4. In order to obtain a subsidy, non-profit developers have to ensure that the price of the land is lower than 250 EUR per sq. m, which becomes very rare. Therefore, the Land of Vienna created a specific incentive called ‘Wohnbauinitiative’ which guarantees a preferential loan for financing affordable housing projects for both non-profit and private developers.

5. When renting (normal rent or rent with purchasing option), each person has to pay an ‘entry’ contribution (about 500 EUR/sq. m, depending on the project), and pays then a more affordable monthly rent. To conduct our analysis, we took into consideration only the monthly rent.