10 major professional organizations alert the government to the urgency of implementing a real housing policy

To support the French in their legitimate demand for a residential pathway and to overcome the serious housing crisis that has taken hold, the members of the Alliance, in their diversity, have identified urgent subjects on which they have challenged the government.

• Restore the zero-interest loan which, since its creation almost 30 years ago, has enabled more than 3,6 million families to access property.
• Temporarily boost the acquisition of new housing through a partial exemption from transfer taxes.
• Limit credit refusals by truly relaxing or temporarily suspending the rules of the High Financial Stability Council.
• Facilitate the transfer between members of the same family to build or acquire a main residence.
• Establish a private lessor status, a real lasting depreciation system which would facilitate the investment of owners in both new and old properties.
• Take real measures to scale up energy renovation for all households: simplify and stabilize the terms and conditions of financing.
• Return to the decline in APL which imposes a levy of 1,3 billion euros on social landlords every year and restore their investment capacity by returning to a reduced VAT rate of 5,5%.

The members of the Alliance point out that they will not be able to be satisfied with a vague decentralization project which would lead to hiding the absence of a housing policy. To the extent that expectations remain unclear and without serious evaluation at this stage, many questions arise about the means and skills associated with this approach.

The Alliance also insists on the essential assessment of housing needs, both qualitatively and quantitatively: this is a major imperative given the challenges in terms of national low carbon strategy, territorial planning and employment links. -accommodation.

Conjuncture

In 2023, with around 280.000 new construction starts, France has reached a level close to its historic lows recorded at the beginning of the 1990s. As for transactions in old buildings, they fall below the threshold of 900.000 housing units and will continue to decline in 2024. Only housing improvement-maintenance shows an increase, and even accelerates to +2,4% excluding the price effect, driven by energy renovation.

January 2024 confirms that the context will remain unfavorable this year for the sector, despite a stabilization, or even a very modest drop in interest rates to come. The deterioration of the institutional environment will reinforce this fundamental movement, with the cuts made to the PTZ, the continued decline in APL, the scheduled end of “Pinel” in 2025, but also the destabilizing reform of MaPrimeRénov'.

If no emergency measures are taken, according to FFB estimates, new housing activity will plunge by 21,3% in 2024, penalized by the continued fall in construction site openings, a direct consequence of the fall in sales. of new housing of around 30%: they would fall to a historic low of 241.000 units. As for permits, they would fall by another 12,1%. The improvement and maintenance of housing would slow down, to +1,1%, given the reform of MaPrimeRénov' already mentioned (and under the hypothesis of a contained decline), but also the fall in transactions of old housing observed in 2023, which could further decline by around 10% in 2024.

The French's housing difficulties are accelerating: the number of rental advertisements has decreased by almost 60% in 5 years and buyers' borrowing capacity has fallen by 25% since January 2022.

In 2023, French economic growth has decelerated. A major factor explains this movement and structurally penalizes the evolution of GDP since 2022: household investment, made up of more than 80% of housing expenditure (new construction or heavy works), which fell by 4,9% in 2023.

Concerning the household real estate loan market, despite the monthly payment of the usury rate taking place in February 2023 making it possible to remove certain blockages, the surge in interest rates caused a continuous fall in production throughout 2023, of approximately 40% on annual average. The purchasing capacity of a buyer who has a monthly payment of 1000 euros over 20 years decreased by 54.000 euros between the start of 2022 and the end of 2023, going from 216.000 euros to 162.000 euros.

As for the production of new housing, it turned around in 2023, showing a decline of 7,8% excluding the price effect. The sharp drop in sales in 2023 suggests an even greater decline in the production of new housing.

Thus, there are only around 280.000 housing units started at an annual rate at the end of November 2023, barely above the historic low points of 1992 and 1993 (around 275.000 units). The plunge in authorizations is slightly faster, at -23,9% over one year. They land at 372.400 units in 2023, the lowest level recorded since 1999.

Regarding social rental housing, although the examination period for 2023 approvals is extended to the beginning of 2024, the mark of 90.000 approvals will undoubtedly not be reached. Thus, the year 2023 will be that of the weakest year of social rental housing programming since 2005. As a reminder, since 2016 approvals for social rental housing (excluding ANRU reconstitution, excluding Overseas Territories) have experienced a significant decline. Meanwhile, under the pressure of the crisis, the number of applicants for social housing continues to increase. Nearly 2,6 million requests were registered as of December 31, 2023 in the National Registration System (2,4 million as of December 31, 2022).

As for the existing situation, there will be 875.000 transactions in 2023, a fall of 22% and the sharpest contraction observed in 50 years.

Finally, improvement-maintenance emerges as the only growing housing segment in 2023, with +2,4% at constant prices.

In 2024, new housing will suffer a very sharp decline in sales in 2023 (from -30% to -40%), but also in HLM approvals since 2021 (less than 100.000 per year). The amputation of the PTZ and the disappearance of the Pinel without an alternative will worsen the situation.

As for activity in housing improvement and maintenance, it will slow down, to +1,1% in volume after +2,4% in 2023. Energy renovation like other work will experience a decline.

Consequently, even if we retain per capita productivity gains of 1%, salaried and temporary employment (in FTE) in construction would decline by 6,5% in 2024, or 90.000 direct jobs destroyed on average over the year. The destruction of jobs should be of the same magnitude for all companies in the ecosystem: architects, notaries, design offices, promoters, builders, developers, etc.