Housing News Digest
Housing News Digest
The Tenants' Union Housing News Digest compiles our pick of items from all the latest tenancy and housing media, sent once per week, on Thursdays.
Below is the Digest archive from November 2020 onwards. From time to time you will find additional items in the archive that did not make it into the weekly Digest email. Earlier archives are here, where you can also find additional digests by other organisations.
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Archive
Can teachers afford to buy a house in Europe, and how long would it take?
Servet Yanatma Euro News (No paywall)Housing is a major influence on whether teachers will continue teaching as a career in the UK according to a 2023 survey by the National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT). In fact, more than half (57%) of teachers who wish to buy a home do not think this will be achievable on a teachers’ salary. So, how realistic is it for European teachers to buy a house? Euronews compared teacher salaries and house prices across Europe, and calculated how many months' salary a teacher would need to buy a house or flat as in 2023.
https://www.euronews.com/business/2025/04/12/can-teachers-afford…
# Hot topic International, .Rents in UK are rising at highest rate in decades. Will they keep going up?
Liam Geraghty The Big Issue (UK) (No paywall)Rents in the UK are now at the highest point on record, surging beyond wider inflation and leaving renters on low incomes struggling to keep up or find an affordable place to live. Average private rents in the UK increased by 7.7% in the 12 months up to March 2025, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). That is slightly down on the 8.1% recorded up to February 2025.But, with UK inflation currently at 2.6% and wage growth at 5.8%, rents are outstripping both with renters feeling the pain of rising bills too.
https://www.bigissue.com/news/housing/rents-in-the-uk-are-rising…
# International, .Sweden's Rent Hike Slows in 2025 but Remains a Struggle for Many
Sweden Herald (No paywall)In total – both for public housing and private property companies – rents for 1.4 million apartments have been increased on average by 4.8 percent. This is clear after nearly 90 percent of the negotiations are complete. For public housing, the average increase was lower – 4.7 percent, and the claim was on average 7.7 percent. For private property companies, the claim was on average 11.2 percent, where the increase landed on average at 4.9 percent.
https://swedenherald.com/article/swedens-rent-hike-slows-in-2025…
# International, Rent.Is ‘Walk Score’ Really Just a ‘White Score’?
Kea Wilson StreetsBlog USA (No paywall)Neighborhoods that score highly on the "Walk Score" metric are more likely to be disproportionately white, a new study finds — and it may be creating a troubling feedback loop that drives investment away from neighborhoods of color, and towards the communities that need it least. In a provocative new paper, researchers Kate Lowe of the University of Illinois Chicago and Anna Brand of the University of California, Berkeley found that Windy City census tracts that were rated most highly by the popular real estate algorithm mapped almost exactly onto the census tracts with the highest share of white residents — and a literature review suggested that the same thing is likely true in other dense urban areas.
https://usa.streetsblog.org/2025/04/07/is-walk-score-really-just…
# Must read International, .Suburbs surge, cities slide: Which EU countries saw rents and house prices rise?
Inês Trindade Pereira Euro News (No paywall)According to the latest Eurostat figures, the EU is facing a continued upward trend in housing costs. In the last three months of 2024, house prices across the EU rose by 4.9%, while rents increased by 3.2% compared with the same period in 2023. And in 2024, while house prices increased less than inflation in seven EU countries (Germany, France, Luxembourg, Austria, Romania, Finland and Sweden), they outpaced inflation in all other member states. Between 2010 and 2024, house prices increased more than rents nationwide in 21 EU countries. Over the same period, house prices more than tripled in Hungary (+234%) and Estonia (+228%).
https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/04/15/suburbs-surge-citi…
# Hot topic International, Rent.The 25 U.S. cities where a $100,000 salary still isn't enough to get by
Mary Cunningham CBS News (No paywall)Reaching the six-figure salary threshold may be considered a financial victory for many Americans, but in a many big U.S. cities the once aspirational milestone just doesn't cut it anymore. In one out of four large metro areas in the United States, a family of three with a household income of $100,000 will still struggle to get by, a LendingTree analysis reveals. That's a stark realization for many Americans, who continue to face rising household expenses on everything from a dozen eggs to a bag of coffee. The average median household income in then U.S. was $80,610 in 2023, according to the most recent estimate from the Census Bureau.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/six-figures-and-broke-cities-lendin…
# Must read International, .The squabbling, the vomiting, the freeloading and the noisy sex: my 10 worst house-share moments
Alice Wilkinson The Guardian (No paywall)The only people I know who speak glowingly about house shares are the ones no longer living in them. When I hear someone describe their house-sharing era as the “best time of my life”, I know they have had at least two years to forget their trauma. That is not a luxury afforded to me – I am living in my eighth house share with my 18th housemate, still holding on to past horrors like they happened yesterday and facing the anxiety they may happen again. So here they are: the 10 worst moments from my many house shares.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/apr/09/the-squabbl…
# Hot topic International, Rent, Share houses.Rent burden causing housing stress, deputy says
Gemma Daubeney BBC (No paywall)Jersey ministers are being urged to come up with a different way of setting rent for social housing. Social housing rents are currently set at 80% of what they would be in the private market. Deputy Raluca Kovacs said this made social rent too expensive and it was causing rental stress. She proposed a new policy with lower, more predictable rents to help reduce tenants' reliance on benefit payments. Housing Minister Sam Mézec said: "Reviewing the social housing rents system was in our manifestos and it is an important thing to consider."
# Hot topic International, Public and community housing.