Wealth Inequalities and the Spatial Dynamics of Housing Market in France : A Research Agenda

Wed 5 February 2020

Mill Lane Lecture Rooms

ABOUT THE SPEAKER}
Renaud Le Goix is a Professor of Geography and Urban Studies, Université de Paris, affiliated to UMR Géographie-cités CNRS joint research unit, Head of UMS RIATE (Interdisciplinary Network for Spatial Planning in Europe). His researches focus on metropolitan areas and real-estate markets, in France, in Europe and in the US, analyzing the interactions between property values, segregation patterns, ordinary financialization. His recent book (Sur le front, Publications de la Sorbonne, 2016) uncovers the spatial dynamics of suburban markets and segregation patterns in the Los Angeles area with a focus on relationships between developers, property owners associations and local government bodies. Most recent work focus on the spatial dynamics and inequalities in housing markets, funded by the ANR Dynamite Project. Web : http://www.parisgeo.cnrs.fr/spip.php?article138&lang=en.

{ABSTRACT}
This paper investigates how asset-based welfare policies, residential market volatility, and stratified accumulation and vulnerability impinge upon the economic geography of inequality in housing markets. Since the mid-1990s, housing prices have increased faster than the income of buyers, becoming an important driver of social polarization and household vulnerability. We seek to better explain housing inequality through an empirically-grounded investigation of the factors driving and reinforcing these dynamics, what we refer to as a feedback loop mediating particular housing finance regimes. Our study develops a comparative framework for analysis drawing of three cities (Paris, Lyon, and Avignon) in the French housing system. We examine the relationships between asset-based welfare policies, price instability, and uneven investment accumulation using a methodological approach to integrate real estate data across national and behavioral levels, in order to think across key debates currently underway regarding housing as a driver of socio-spatial inequality.

This paper was prepared under the ANR WIsDHoM project, Wealth inequalities and the dynamics of housing markets. (ANR-18-CE41-0004).

Cost: free