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May green policies lead to housing inequalities? This major question is investigated by the Horizon Europe ReHousIn project through the examples of 27 European cities among them large metropoles, but also middle sized and rural towns. After its first year the ReHousIn project is organizing its first Policy Labs in nine countries, among them in Budapest. The event, that took place on the 1st of April gathered Hungarian actors working on housing and green policies (energy efficient retrofitting, nature-based solutions and densification of urban areas). Through the presentations of the researchers at Metropolitan Research Institute the negative externalities of green investments, strongly experienced in Western European cities like green gentrification and renoviction, were showcased. The workshop in Hungary called the attention to several specificities of the Central European Region. The participants expressed their major concern that the weakness of green policies in Hungary seem to be more harmful to the socially excluded inhabitants than the possible negative effect of their implementation. It was also highly emphasized that due to the super ownership structure of the Hungarian housing stock social movements are much less quick and responsive than in European cities with high rate of rental units, which slows down gentrification and renoviction. On the other hand, Hungarian municipalities lack the tools to influence strongly the potential negative housing impacts of green investments, as they own less than 2.5% of the housing stock, and due to general centralization trends, they also have less and less financial resources and are crowded out from many fields of public policies.

MRI is the leader of a consortium (with Politecnico Torino and University of Valencia) implementing the ESPON URDICO project. This one year project aims to analyse and compare the implementation of the Urban Dimension of Cohesion Policy in a diverse group of cities and urban areas. Data and qualitative analyses will explore (for the periods 2014-2020 and 2021 onwards) the different approaches to sustainable urban development in the cities/urban areas of Budapest, Florence, Ghent, Prague, Rotterdam, Strasbourg, Valencia, and Warsaw. Local experts and Eurocities are part of the working team, which is supported also by other organizations, like France Urbaine, Deutscher Städtetag, the Italian ANCI, the Dutch VNG, EUI and JRC, which act as observers. The Kick Off meeting was held in Budapest on 28 January.

For more information: https://www.espon.eu/projects/urdico-urban-dimension-cohesion-policy-and-other-eu-programmes

On the 17 of March Metropolitan Research Institute organised workshop dealing with the planning dilemmas of the Social Climate Plan in Hungary in the framework of the ComActivate project. The representative of the Ministry of Energy presented on the framework conditions and the current state of planning. The plenary was followed by three parallel thematic sessions.

The goal of the Social Climate Plan is to mitigate the price impact of the Emission Trading System (2) on buildings and transportation. One year before the introduction of ETS2 (1 of January 2026 according to plans) the member states should implement measures that decrease energy poverty in the building sector but primarily not by income support (however, it is also allowed), but by structural interventions into the renovation of the building stock.

The European Commission has developed methodological guidance on the creation of the national Social Climate Plans, but these guidelines could not properly take into account the differences between the member states. The Hungarian housing stock is much more owner occupied and socially more mixed also spatially and within the same buildings than the ones in Western Europe. Under these circumstances, it is much more difficult to support exclusively the energy poor.

The participants at the workshop aimed to find solutions on how to identify the energy poor in the privately owned family house, multi-family buildings and municipally owned housing segments, and besides that how it can be ensured that the non-energy poor leverage their funds as well.

We have reached the first milestone in the SOLACE CEE project! Over the past few months, several important events have taken place: in October 2024, we held the kickoff meeting in Košice, and then in December, the innovation team met in Budapest. Our working group has completed several important tasks in the past few months:

• We prepared the Monitoring and Evaluation Plan, which included developing surveys and interviews for the involved clients and professionals.

• We organized separate online meetings for project partners to ensure that the data collection elements matched the individual needs of the organizations.

• Due to the different target groups, we needed to create specialized surveys: separate questionnaires were developed for individuals and households.

• Our team actively participates in the work of the Innovation and Communication teams as well.

Details can be found at the link below: https://mri.hu/en/solace-cee/

Critical presentation on integrated urban development practices at the Croatian Urban Forum in Zagreb The first Urban Forum meeting of Croatian cities took place in Zagreb on 1-2 October. The theme of the meeting was Productive, Green and Just Urban Development. The introductory keynote presentation was given by Iván Tosics, who illustrated with international examples how conflicting the objectives of the conference are. Concrete examples were given of how urban development, disguised under the label of “integrated urban development”, is mostly dominated by one-sided, growth-oriented ideas that run counter to the increasingly pressing requirements of sustainability and resilience.

The presentation is available here:
https://mri.hu/en/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/01/Urban-Forum-Croatia-Ivan-Tosics-241001-Iván-Tosics.pdf

MRI has completed a comparative study, financed by the European Climate Fund, on the renovation subsidy schemes for residential buildings in Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary and Romania. All four countries have subsidy schemes for this purpose for decades, but they are still fundamentally different. The Bulgarian and Romanian scheme focuses on multi-apartment buildings, assuming that the residential communities are lacking both the financial capacities and the technical and organisational skills to implement the renovation, thus the subsidy schemes supports relatively limited number of communities, but these communities receive subsidies up to 100% besides strong technical assistance. The Greek system focuses on flats and the state provides financial subsidies for the renovation, the scale of which depends on the income of the families. Hungary was a pioneer of panel rehabilitation in the 2000s, the dynamics of which was broken due to the financial crisis and the focus of renovation was transferred to family houses. Currently the Home Renovation Programme for family houses struggles to find a balance between securing the proper quality of renovations and still requiring easy to follow administrative processes. The comparative study itself can be found here:

https://mri.hu/en/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/01/ECF-subsidy-systems-in-Eastern-Europe-for-workshop-%C3%89va-Ger%C5%91h%C3%A1zi.pdf

Hanna Szemző and Éva Gerőházi presented the findings of a representative residential survey at the annual conference of the European Network of Housing Researchers in Delft on August 27, 2024. This survey, conducted in October-November 2023 as part of the Budapest Cares project, aimed to gain deeper insights into residents’ attitudes towards renovating their properties in Budapest.

The in-person survey focused on property owners who reside in their homes, gathering information on various aspects, including the condition of their buildings, energy costs, renovation plans, willingness to pay for energy-efficient renovations, and the types of assistance they would need to accelerate the renovation process.

The results were somewhat surprising: 70-80% of property owners neither plan nor consider it necessary to implement any form of energy-efficient renovation in their family houses or multi-apartment flats. Additionally, 85% of owners living in multi-family buildings would not be willing to pay for energy-efficient renovations in common areas.

Two main reasons explain these findings:

1. Nearly half of the respondents believe their building already meets the most recent energy standards or has high energy efficiency (though in reality, less than 2% of this housing stock likely complies with the latest standards).
2. About one-third of respondents feel so financially vulnerable that they cannot even consider renovation, even if subsidies were available.

The survey was conducted at the peak of inflation, and many Budapest residents may have found that the increase in energy prices beyond the “average” consumption level had little impact on them. As a result, financing daily living expenses became a higher priority than energy efficiency. However, the findings indicate that there is still room for public sector intervention. In addition to essential subsidies, increasing public awareness and knowledge about the benefits of energy efficiency is crucial.

Please find the Study here.

Nora Teller from MRI serves as a research manager in the development of a common European Union cross-sectional data collection methodology on homelessness. The project aims to (1) define a common operational definition of homelessness and a common methodology for data collection, and (2) test the common data collection methodology at the urban level in various member states. The project establishes the basis for regular and comparable local-level data collection on homelessness. Thanks to the project, local, national, and European decision-makers can gain insights into the nature and extent of homelessness, as well as the different dimensions of homelessness and the basic characteristics of homeless individuals. Furthermore, the project aims to draw attention to the complexity of homelessness for the general public and policymakers and contribute to consensus building on solutions.

For further details, please read here in Hungarian.

For more details in English, please visit the project website at KU Leuven.

We are excited to announce the launch of the Horizon Europe project, ReHousIn, coordinated by MRI, which officially commenced on March 1st, 2024. We recently held our inaugural online kick-off meeting on March 18, 2024, marking the beginning of our collaborative efforts with the following partners:

• TU Wien,
• University of Vienna,
• Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona,
• SciencesPo,
• Politecnico di Milano,
• Norwegian University of Life Sciences,
• University of Lodz,
• University College London,
• ETH Zürich,
• ICLEI Europe.

The primary objective of ReHousIn is to dissect the intricate mechanisms contributing to the (re)production of housing inequalities and their interconnected relationships. We aim to explore the collective impacts of contemporary crises, including environmental challenges and digital transformations, which have compounded housing disparities.

Despite the positive strides made by certain policy instruments in fostering inclusive urban communities, evidence suggests potential socio-spatial ramifications of initiatives promoting environmental sustainability. These include increased housing costs, ecological gentrification, and exacerbation of wealth disparities.

Moreover, the digital transition presents its own set of challenges, such as uneven access to digital services and the proliferation of housing-related digital platforms, which further contribute to housing inequalities.

In ReHousIn, we posit a central hypothesis that green and digital transition initiatives influence housing inequalities across various levels and domains, contingent upon governance structures and contextual factors. Our approach involves conducting qualitative analyses across nine countries in 27 case study areas (one large city, one medium and one small locality in each country) to comprehensively understand the relative impact of these initiatives.

By refraining from prioritising specific transition initiatives, we aim to provide a nuanced understanding of their respective roles in shaping housing inequalities within diverse urban contexts. Ultimately, ReHousIn seeks to inform policy interventions that promote equitable housing outcomes amidst evolving environmental and digital landscapes.