Real estate markets and deregulation

The way in which real estate markets function in the current context of deregulation, at least until very recently, has impaired two of the pillars of sustainable development. First, social centrifugation, increasing segregation, results from the very workings of a deregulated market: low-income households are pushed further and further towards the outskirts as real estate values, a key component of housing prices, rise.

These changes and the preference for individual houses combine to produce widespread urban sprawl, which continues to spread despite public policies aimed at reversing this trend.

Although the concept of “the consumption of space” appears debatable, the energy balance of this urban sprawl is disastrous and its development reflects short-sighted urban policies. The relationship between urban forms and energy consumption, a little-documented subject, will be a key element of the research that is liable to clarify public policies.

Contact: Vincent Renard