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This paper examines the experience of households in two adjacent countries, Germany and the Netherlands, both of which have relatively modest levels of home ownership but significantly different housing systems. Population growth is slowing down in Germany, while it is still increasing in the Netherlands. German house prices are stable while Dutch prices have been rising considerably for 25 years now. The central question is whether people in these two different contexts, which are both faced with globalization and social security reforms, have similar perceptions of the securities and insecurities of home ownership. The paper is based on institutional studies and 20 interviews among home owners and ten interviews among tenants in both countries. The central issues here are the perceptions of (in)security and equity. The paper concludes that in both countries home ownership is perceived as a nest-egg and a 'pension in stone'. However, it is also associated with insecurity. In Germany many households saw house prices as a source of insecurity. This can be explained by strong fluctuations in house prices in Germany and the fear that the declining population might adversely affect the situation and hence the 'pension in stone'. In the Netherlands a policy change - particularly a change in tax relief for mortgage-holders - was the main worry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper will set out the concept of a 'gap' between the social rented and market rented housing sector. This will be examined with respect to one aspect of competition between the two sectors in England, France, the Netherlands and Germany: substitutability. The analysis will involve an examination of the extent to which tenants can choose between the two sectors. The price-quality bundles of housing services as expressed by the characteristics of the accommodation, the property rights of the tenants, the allocation system and the housing allowances in the different countries will be compared. Competition measured in this way seems to be rather larger than smaller in the Netherlands and Germany and rather small in England. France's intermediate sector partly closes the gap between both rental tenures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proportion of social rental housing has fallen very strongly in the former West Germany since the middle of the 1960s. In comparison with other European countries, Germany has only a small social housing quota but a high percentage of private rental housing. For the future, a further decline in the social housing quota is expected. This paper compares the definition of social housing in Germany with the definitions in other countries. It also shows how housing policy has responded to the declining social housing stocks and tries to explain the large private rental sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Housing policies often promote homeownership in order to stabilise a given urban neighbourhood, assuming that investment in housing will result as well in investment in the neighbourhood. This reasoning has been guiding housing policies in many countries and is supported by many empirical studies. Does this thesis hold true for deprived areas as well? Is increasing ownership an appropriate strategy to 'stabilize' deprived neighbourhoods? To investigate these questions, we analysed data from a representative survey in a deprived neighbourhood in Cologne, Germany. We asked both owners and renters about their attitudes towards disorder, collective efficacy and social control. Results indicate significant differences between these groups: owners perceive more social control and more social capital in the neighbourhood and less disorder. The policy implications of these findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]