00:00Across Europe, having your own home is becoming a luxury.
00:04Rents are soaring, families are struggling to find affordable housing,
00:08and young people are still living with their parents for longer than ever.
00:11But one city has been long seen as different – Vienna.
00:16It still has a large social housing sector and comparatively stable rents.
00:20You can see what's happened in other cities when governments haven't intervened.
00:24In some places, rents have become unaffordable.
00:27We've spoken to politicians, housing experts and residents
00:30to understand why Vienna has been more successful than other European cities,
00:34and where even this model is beginning to come under pressure.
00:39A playground right outside their front door, only for residents.
00:43For the Boschkowicz family, that's now everyday life.
00:46Do you like this playground?
00:47They moved into the newly built SOFI 7 housing development in central Vienna in May.
00:53It is part of the city's publicly subsidised housing programme.
00:56This is where we live.
00:58In this building, we've got a senior citizen centre,
01:00a kindergarten and adult education centre and a restaurant.
01:05This former hospital site has been transformed into 222 subsidised apartments.
01:10Hundreds of people applied for a home here.
01:15We honestly thought we'd never get one of these apartments.
01:18It's a brand new development, with green spaces right in the middle.
01:22The family had wanted to move for a long time.
01:25Their eldest son, Nemanja, has severe epilepsy and often suffers seizures during the night.
01:30They desperately needed another bedroom, so his younger brother Theo wouldn't have to witness them.
01:35That was our main reason for wanting to move as quickly as possible.
01:42Last summer was really difficult.
01:47Our older son couldn't cope well with the heat.
01:51We can't just take him swimming.
01:55So having a balcony where we can set up a paddling pool makes a huge difference.
02:01The family pays around 1,000 euros a month for their 90 square meter apartment.
02:06With a combined net income of about 5,500 euros, they are firmly in the middle class bracket.
02:12That's no contradiction in Vienna.
02:14Subsidised housing here is deliberately designed to not just be for the poorest households.
02:19It's an affordable apartment. And when you think it's actually public housing,
02:23it doesn't look anything like the old stereotype of municipal housing.
02:28Vienna's housing model is often praised internationally.
02:31Unlike many other cities, Vienna never sold off large parts of its public housing stock.
02:36Today, more than 60% of residents live in municipal or subsidised housing.
02:40That gives the city significant influence over its housing market.
02:44One place where that approach is visible is in Seestadt Aspern.
02:48Around 15 kilometres northeast of the city centre.
02:51What used to be an airfield is now becoming a completely new district for around 24,000 people,
02:57including with its own lake for swimming.
03:00One who has been involved from the very beginning is urban planner Kurt Hofstetter.
03:04He says Vienna's approach is about much more than simply building apartments.
03:09Schools, shops, restaurants and public transport are planned from the outset.
03:15That was extremely important because it allowed us to shape how people would move around the district.
03:21We could tell them, move to Seestadt, bring everything you need except your car.
03:26The metro is already here.
03:28Around two thirds of the apartments here were built by non-profit housing associations.
03:34Only one third is privately financed.
03:36The aim is for people from different income groups to live side by side, while most of the land remains
03:41in public ownership.
03:43Compared with cities like New York or London, the difference is enormous.
03:47Their people in social housing are often seen as those who have failed.
03:50In Vienna it's completely different.
03:52Because of the quality competitions, social housing is often better than private developments, despite being cheaper.
03:58That's because there's no profit extraction.
04:02Elke Hanel-Torsch is Vienna's housing councillor and responsible for implementing the city's housing policy.
04:08She says Vienna's commitment to social housing dates back to the end of the First World War.
04:14There was a severe housing shortage then, and the city made it a priority to provide affordable, secure and high
04:20-quality housing for the people of Vienna.
04:23Viennese authorities have deliberately chosen not to leave housing entirely to the market. Why?
04:31Housing is a basic human need, and basic needs should not be simply left to market forces.
04:36You can see what happens in cities where governments don't intervene. Housing simply becomes unaffordable.
04:44But does Vienna really have the perfect model?
04:47Not quite, says housing sociologist Christoph Reinbrecht from the University of Vienna.
04:51Even Austria's capital is no longer immune to today's housing pressures.
04:56Land prices, construction costs and operating costs have risen, which also affects municipal housing, and that's brought painful rent increases.
05:07Over the past decade, rents for municipal housing have increased by around a third, while rents for privately owned apartments
05:13have risen by about half.
05:15Rising construction costs have also slowed down the construction of new social housing.
05:20As a result, affordable homes have become harder to find, especially for people who are new to Vienna's housing market.
05:27Finding an apartment here still involves a lot of luck. Some people inherited old tenancy agreements and pay almost nothing.
05:35I've lived here since 1982. My rent is just 475 euros for a 100 square meter apartment. I really don't
05:43envy young people trying to find housing these days.
05:46Even so, Vienna is still widely regarded as a leader in social housing. So what can other cities learn?
05:53The most important lesson is to maintain a large housing stock that isn't completely exposed to the market. That takes
06:00decades.
06:01But once you have it, you shouldn't privatize it or hand it over entirely to market forces.
06:08The Boscovic family has now settled into its new home. For them, solving their housing problem means something much bigger.
06:16Now we can finally focus on what really matters. In our case, that's our son.
06:24Pressures on housing are growing in Vienna too. But the city still shows that political choices can help shape the
06:31market, especially when housing is treated as more than just another commodity.
06:35Pressures on housing are open to your own society.
06:38Pressures on housing.
06:38Pressures on housing.
06:39Pressures on housing.
