Why is housing not an election issue? It is, after all, the only issue that has brought down a government in the last 35 years. The basis of your well-being is a home. Therefore, your right to housing is even enshrined in the constitution. In the first chapter, second paragraph of the form of government, it is stated: "In particular, the public must secure the right to work, housing and education."
Linking housing to work and education is self-evident. Functioning labor markets require housing where labor is in demand. If higher education is to function, there must be housing for students, teachers and researchers where universities and colleges are located.
According to the law, it is the municipalities that must plan for housing provision and create the conditions for all residents to live in good housing. They have tools for that: the Planning and Building Act, housing agencies and municipal housing companies. In addition, many municipalities own land on which to build the homes.
The reason it's not an election issue is that it actually works great, by and large. For a long time, the number of homes per inhabitant in Sweden has been constant. Where most people in Sweden live, housing supply is not a problem. Where the population is shrinking, there is rarely a shortage of housing.
In municipalities that are growing, housing is built as the number of residents increases. It requires political will and action, but it exists. In most places, municipal councilors care about their labor market and know that well-functioning universities are the best growth engine a municipality can have.
But it doesn't work in the big cities. In Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö, the number of homes per inhabitant is lower today than after the property crisis in the 1990s.
If you can neither find nor afford your own home, if you cannot move away from home, separate, move to something bigger when the family grows or simply cannot afford to move to a big city, then you are denied your constitutional right. Not because of the market, the market has never promised you anything, but because of municipal politicians who break the law.
The problems are least in Greater Malmö, partly thanks to well-thought-out and purposeful urban planning policy ever since Ilmar Reepalu took over in 1994, partly thanks to the fact that the university city of Lund is part of the metropolitan area. More people move to greater Malmö than move from there.
The biggest problems are in Greater Stockholm. If we compare the number of homes per inhabitant with the 1990s, 50,000 homes are missing. The housing queue is longer and the housing more expensive than anywhere else. This has made Stockholm a place of emigration. Since 2018, almost 25,000 more people have moved out than moved in. Many move to Malmö, even more to Södermanland and Uppsala counties.
In the past, there has been a political will to do something about it. The city of Stockholm has long had political agreement across block boundaries regarding an ambitious housing construction target. In the Stockholm negotiations in 2013 and the Sweden negotiations in 2017, eight crown municipalities promised to build a total of 75,000 homes in exchange for government investments in subways and tramways.
But now the agreements are about to break. It started with Lidingö municipality. The moderate government, together with Danderyd, has declared that they ignore the housing supply and have thrown concluded agreements in the wastebasket. They do not intend to build any housing at all. Above all, not multi-apartment buildings, which they contemptuously call "million dollar programs".
The attitude has spread. In the city of Stockholm, previously only the SD was against housing construction, but now the Moderates have followed suit. Last autumn they announced that they want to scrap the housing target and in the future only build villas and terraced houses. The Green Party, in turn, wants to scrap the target in order to save more green areas. Even the Social Democrats are prepared to reconsider the targets for housing construction.
It is strange. SD's position in the Riksdag can explain that other parties are aping their policies. But in Stockholm SD is small. Why do the Moderates oppose economic growth and the interests of business? Why does the Green Party want those who work in Stockholm, where public transport and climate-smart infrastructure exist, to settle in other counties and become dependent on the car? Why do the Social Democrats go against the Tenants' Movement's goal of affordable housing for all?
One explanation is, of course, the economy. Housing prices in Stockholm are still ten percent below the price peak during the pandemic, in fixed prices. The construction of tenements has also been affected. Banks and financial institutions that let the capital flow abundantly over the housing builders in the 2010s have turned off the faucet.
In addition, all parties, from the Left Party to the Moderates, are divided between those who want the city to grow and those who do not. For the past ten years, those who want to see the city grow have had the upper hand. Building housing has been profitable. Not only for the housing developers, but also for the municipalities, who have been able to sell their land expensively. Those who wanted to grow had tailwinds. Now the roles are reversed.
Those who own their home and have benefited from the rising house prices want to keep them high. If the housing shortage is removed, prices would fall. No wonder that many people would rather have the sledding hill into the knot than new neighbors in new houses.
This is of course an advantage for other parts of Sweden, at least in the short term. Other counties can offer housing for Stockholm commuters who can work from home a couple of days a week. University towns can attract students by offering not only education but also housing.
But only in the short term. After all, Sweden needs big cities. In the longer term, it becomes a problem for the whole of Sweden when they stagnate. If the municipalities of the big cities sit idly by and wait for prices to start rising again, not only will housing become even more unaffordable. The economic downturns are also getting deeper.
So if we happen to get a government this autumn that wants to secure growth and the right to housing, even in the big cities, what can it do?
One tip is to stop messing with the planning and building legislation and thereby causing problems for all the places where the housing supply actually works. Instead, such a government can guarantee the availability of capital for housing construction with government loan guarantees. It is not reasonable for housing construction to be throttled as soon as the banks want to reduce their credit risks.
The government can also ensure that the municipalities keep the agreements entered into. And, most importantly, force the municipalities in the big cities, especially Stockholm, to comply with the constitution and housing provision law. Forcing the municipalities to take their statutory responsibility for housing provision is hopefully not impossible. The county administrative boards must distribute the responsibility for housing supply between the municipalities in the big cities, and force those who are struggling to plan for housing. If they don't, the government can force them to plan for housing, just as the current one does with municipalities that don't want to plan for new mines.
Those points would solve the housing issue so that the right to a home is secured throughout Sweden, even in the big cities. It doesn't have to be more difficult than that.
