A/68/289
receipt of housing benefit). 60 Furthermore, the substantial cuts in housing benefits
currently applied in various countries as part of recent austerity measures are likely
to exacerbate the problem (see A/67/286, para. 32). 61
33. On the other hand, the cost of rent subsidies for low-income households is
significantly lower than the cost of subsidies for homeownership. Moreover, for
families with a very low and unstable income, rent subsidies can provide a better
alternative than homeownership. Research done in Brazil, for instance, has shown
that very low-income households tend to sell their private homes, in particular the
very poorly located ones, and move back to informal settlements.
5.
Rent legislation and rent control
34. One of the main means of securing affordability and tenure for low-income
tenants in private rental arrangements is rent legislation, regulation and control. 62
Rent regulation varies greatly between regions, but typically includes two main
elements: (a) security of tenure, establishing a minimum duration of occupancy as
well as limitations on the eviction of tenants; and (b) control on levels of price
increase, intended both to preserve affordability and to preclude de facto economic
eviction. Rent control regimes tend to establish the amount and frequency of rent
increases, linking it to fiscal measures such as inflation rates. 63 In general,
restrictions on rent increases are maintained only during sitting tenancy. 64
35. Critics of rent control and regulation claim that such measures produce
inefficiencies, distort market values, reduce the housing supply and encourage
corruption and low housing maintenance. 65 Rent regulation has also been criticized
for not targeting low-income households since controlled rents and protected
tenancies usually favour those who have lived in rental housing for years over
potential new tenants, 66 and there is no mechanism to ensure that those benefitting
from rent control are the low-income households. 67
36. In some countries, however, notably, Austria, Germany and Switzerland, and
over the course of many decades, in some cities like New York and San Francisco in
the United States (see A/HRC/13/20/Add.4, para. 44), rent regulation has had
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61
62
63
64
65
66
67
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Dugald Monro, “Public rental housing policy” (see footnote 57 above); see also Kemp, “Lowincome tenants” (see footnote 40 above), p.1032.
For example in the United Kingdom (see Kemp, “Low-income tenants” (footnote 40 above),
p. 1022). Funding cuts have contributed to the loss of over 150,000 vouchers in the United
States between 2005 and 2007( see A/HRC/13/20/Add. 4, para. 36).
S. I. Kalim, “Rent-control legislation and its impacts in Karachi”, in Rental Housing:
Proceedings of an Experts Group Meeting (Nairobi, United Nations Centre for Human
Settlements, 1990), pp. 186 and 188.
Marietta Haffner, Marja Elsinga and Joris Hoekstra, “Balance between landlord and tenant? A
comparison of the rent regulation in the private rental sector in five countries”, for the European
Network for Housing Research 2007 International Conference on “Sustainable Urban Areas”
Pomeroy and Godbout, “Development of the rental housing market” (see footnote 50 above),
p. 16.
“The great Manhattan rip-off”, The Economist (5 June 2003); see also Towards a Sustainable
Private Rented Sector (see footnote 40 above), p. 10.
A. Malpezzi, “Rental housing in developing countries: issues and constraints, in Rental
Housing: Proceedings of an Experts Group Meeting (Nairobi, United Nations Centre for Human
Settlements, 1990), pp. 104 and 113.
S. Kumar, “Landlordism in Third World urban low-income settlements: a case for further
research, Urban Studies (1996), pp. 768-769.
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