This policy paper on the Affordable Housing Plan (AHP) defines which aspects of the plan are effective for Romania and which are not, given the significant gaps between the plan’s ambitions and the country’s specific realities and needs.
Romania’s housing challenges are shaped by a distinct post-communist trajectory: despite holding one of the highest homeownership rates in the EU (95.6%), the country simultaneously suffers from severe overcrowding, an aging and energy-inefficient building stock, high construction costs, and deep rural poverty. These structural conditions mean that several of the AHP’s core mechanisms are unlikely to produce long-term, feasible outcomes in Romania without meaningful adaptation.
Author’s Insights:
„The European Affordable Plan could have benefited from a more clearly defined approach to housing affordability, which could better support the Member States to establish a common definition or outline specific objectives aimed at addressing housing vulnerability among vulnerable groups. The plan should provide a clearer framework for identifying these vulnerable groups with explicit acknowledgment of their ethnic background and immigration status as factors influencing access to affordable housing.
It should further acknowledge the specific challenges faced by rural communities, including limited access to social services, insufficient funding for renovations, and the lack of basic amenities. Finally, the AHP could prioritise renovation and conversion of existing buildings into social housing or student housing for the Member States that do not primarily require large-scale new construction.”
– Daniela Panica
For or further details and media inquiries, please contact Daniela Panica: daniela.panica@epg-thinktank.org