Sweden's housing policy and the quest for tenure neutrality

Abstract

The Swedish housing policy decision of 1974 is internationally unique in its specific quest to establish neutrality between housing tenures, not only in terms of costs, but also with regard to housing standard and household influence over housing management. After presenting the 1974 policy objectives, an interpretation of these goals is attempted in order to establish criteria for an evaluation of goal achievement. Then the present state of affairs for each of the three target areas is compared to the criteria. It is found that the record of achievement with respect to standards is mixed; while there is a visible and steady trend towards greater tenure diversity in single‐family housing production, the size variation is, if anything, diminishing in the multi‐family housing sector. As for household Influence, the self‐regulatory strategy involving tenants and public housing companies has increased collective tenant influence. Certain legislative measures have increased individual tenant influence over repair and maintenance. However, tenant rights are still inferior to those of homeowners. Finally, the objective of cost neutrality seems to have come increasingly closer to achievement in. latter years, if one limits the perspectives just to housing consumption. If the possibilities of extracting the exchange value from housing are taken into account, homeowners still seem favoured compared to tenants. It is concluded that if a greater extent of end‐state neutrality is to be achieved, housing policy would have to be more “non‐neutral” towards the tenures than has been the case’ so far.

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