Housing in the Czech Republic - Ideas and Economic Reality

Petr Sunega

Abstract:

This paper deals primarily with the problem of the accessibility of housing in the Czech Republic. The introduction outlines the individual sectors of the housing market according to divisions applied in the countries of the EU. More space is devoted to the issue of ownership housing, which forms a significant proportion of the total housing stock in developed European countries (from 38% in Germany to 80% in Ireland, and 42% in the Czech Republic according to data from 1994). On the basis of data drawn from the survey Attitudes to Housing in the Czech Republic 2001, the satisfaction of the Czech population with current housing is assessed, particularly with regard to the housing tenure. From the evaluation it is clear that in the Czech Republic, home owners are the most satisfied with their housing.

The second part of the paper focuses on an evaluation of housing accessibility in the Czech Republic - physical availability and financial affordability of housing. Physical availability is compared with the situation in other selected countries. The financial affordability of ownership housing is analysed for cases in which the household relies only on its own financial resources (savings) and cases in which a combination of building savings and mortgage loans is used.