Hur arbetar mindre svenska fastighetsföretag med sociala utmaningar? : En kvalitativ studie om social hållbarhet inom mindre fastighetsföretag i Sverige

The increasing focus on sustainability that has become even more prominent in society today, has had a considerate impact on the real estate industry. The shift of focus in the industry has led to an increased demand of sustainable solutions and practice. Social sustainability has been deprioritized by company’s choices of investing towards ecological sustainability instead. Social risks as exclusion, unemployment, and criminality are common in many counties in Sweden today. This has inspired and forced social sustainability strategies among the real estate companies to work against the social risks in Sweden. The progress in this field is clear in the bigger companies in the industry, whereas the smaller companies tend to fall behind. This leads to the purpose of this essay which is to answer how small real estate companies work towards social sustainability in Sweden. The data collection in this essay is gathered through a qualitative research method, the method consists of semi-structured interviews with five real estate companies. The respondents included in the essay holds positions like sustainability-officer, property developer and CEO. Whereas the companies are operating in smaller Swedish counties. The essay could through the empirical data conclude that all the companies work toward social sustainability to different extents. All except one company has a long-term plan in place for how their company with work with social sustainability. The conclusion drawn in the essay tells how smaller real estate companies intend to have similar strategies to how they create social sustainability. For example, the companies issue common areas where the tenant can socialize, youths with limited work experience are employed over the summer and cooperating with police. Some of the strategies and measures taken that were encountered can be tied to CSV through CSI or CSR. Although several self-interested actions were detected, actions that were not able to be linked with the