Housing crisis in Poland.

Apartment and house prices in Warsaw have been rocketing for some time. Now, the price someone would have paid to rent a small apartment several years ago would barely pay for a room, and decent houses are further out of reach of people on ordinary wages.

"Rents in Warsaw and other Polish cities have risen to such a degree that the poorest are now having to live on allotments or squat in empty buildings."

balkaninsight.com/2023/03/21/desperate-measures-as-housing-crisis-grips-poland/

Recently someone tried to sell micro-apartments, the size of a broom cupboard however fortunately teh city is refusing to certify them.
"Warsaw....refused to issue certification for 157 "micro-apartments".... nicknamed by locals "Hong Kong" for its tightly packed blocks... properties, officially built as hotel rooms, are below the statutory minimum size for residential dwellings."

notesfrompoland.com/2023/02/24/warsaw-refuses-to-certify-157-micro-apartments-in-citys-hong-kong-complex/

How can this be solved,

We must win the war.

I don't think it's just the war; that's a factor, however prices started to rise before that.

Property prices in Germany are already falling.

I hope Britain's will too; especially in the Home Counties where prices are ridiculous compared with the North.

In Warsaw though, it's all taken off over the past couple of years and there's a lack of social housing for people who can't afford the market rate. Warsaw prices are higher than in Manchester, a larger conurbation with higher salaries and more social housing.

Its crazy.Flat prices are over 15k pln a sqm,should look at commercials over 19k to 40k sq m,I wonder how are people buying paying 11/12% interest.Same here in NJ also,we have been looking for a house for my daughter and half way decent house is not less then 500k.As in Poland here too builders are not building and the people who have 2.5% mortgage rates are not selling.Most sellers are retirees downsizing,divorcing cpls or people with cash looking to upgrade.


Ukrainians who have settled in the west will still stay there and will most likely not go back.They bought money esp cash and are buying paying high prices then the locals.I get emails in Ukranian/russian to sell in Poland everyday with cash offers.


Hope fully in the US too,inshallah.I doubt it will happen in Poland though,they have never seen property price fall and is way cheaper to sit on the property and wait for good times.


EASY,just live in a commie building in a rented flat in a crappy suburb and be behind on rent by 2 months:))))

I wouldn't fancy doing that; you can if you like.

It's a problem across Warsaw at the moment; where we are there's nothing less than a couple of million zl for an apartmentnand the only new-builds were sold off-plan for a fortune.

All bubbles will burst someday.

One of the problems is a f*cked up law in Poland concerning renting flats:

wiadomosci.wp.pl/zyja-na-czyjs-koszt-tak-sie-kradnie-mieszkania-w-polsce-6874953978678048a

Flat owners who are renting flats aren't being protected by the law. There are people who are renting flats and pay only at the beginning. Later on they stop paying for anything - not only the rent, but also for water, electricity, gas, etc. They're living there at the expense of the flat owner.

And the flat owner can't throw them out according to the law. Because of this many flat owners prefer to keep the flat empty, rather than rent it. As result - there are less flats to rent for honest people, there's greater demand, people become desperate and prices rise.

I was wondering when this insanity started and according to this article this change in law happened in 2019, so it looks like it's on PiS.

This affects also single mothers with kids. They're very much protected by the law from throwing them out from a rented flat, but since flat owners know about it - they don't want to rent flats to single mothers with children. So, as result, ironically, it's difficult for a single mother to rent a flat. Ukrainian refugees quite often had the same problem - they hit the same wall, because they were usually single mothers with kids. They often thought it's due to anti-Ukrainian prejudice, but in reality people are afraid to rent flats to single mothers, including Polish ones.

Btw, that couple of travellers mentioned in the article who got their flat "stolen" by an unpaying tenant - those are the two travellers from "Planeta Abstrakcja" Youtube channel - I posted their videos in the thread "Poland`s aid to Ukraine if Russia invades" - they were driving to Ukraine with humanitarian aid and making interviews with people there. Their tenant paid only for two weeks and later she lived at their expense for half a year. They couldn't turn off the water, electricity, etc., even though she wasn't paying for all of that, because that would be illegal. Their fans from Facebook offered that they'll come to that flat with them and stay there until the dishonest tenant leaves. They told the tenant that all those people will live there from now on lol It worked - she moved out.

Not everyone has such devoted fans on Facebook though lol :) and this pathological law creates a market for more or less fishy "security agencies" that offer services of removing such dishonest tenants, since getting your flat back through legal means can take years (the record-breaker - 12 years).

It's just sick.

Also, it looks like PiS instead of resolving the problem - protecting the rights of flat owners and punishing dishonest tenants - wants to punish the flat owners who keep their flats empty by imposing tax on those empty flats.

@Paulina

This whole mess in Poland sounds like typical politicians in many countries, genuinely trying to help people but not thinking their policies through and making it worse for the people they are trying to help,this happens everywhere.

I love your Peaky Blinders gifs!

Even in Stare Młociny?prices where you lived before"Ursynow metro" are over 3 times more now.I know its hard to get out of a rented flat in a commie building and a fu.cked up suburb of Warszawa like Młociny,when metro and biedronka is walking distance esp with a dream to own a car lolol(Do you know in Poland they require a driving license(Prawo Jazdo) to drive a car) lol

Remember the price will keep on going up and dreamers will wait for the prices to fall while living on a fixed income close to retirement age it will only get harder.But its ok to dream about owning a house,land lolololol.dreams are free.

There aren't any 'commie buildings' in that area. Prices are high in that part of Warsaw and always have been. There are some apartments in the bit closest to town, however as I recall none of them are older than about 15 years and some much newer.


Right down in the south? Not a good area, although there are some nice new builds around there.


We just bought one, mostly for weekend use. The metro is sadly beyond walking distance however there's a park and ride. Not many people from our neighbourhood use it though; once you've driven there, you may as well continue into Śródmieście.

I'd not like to live in your area though; aside from the seedy gogo clubs and shisha bars, the housing stock is poor and cramped.

I just read about that jon and couldn't believe how some Poles are making palaces out of them.
When up to your ass in lemons, make lemonade.
Just don't break wind.

msn.com/en-us/news/world/living-in-poland-s-micro-apartments/vi-BB1pAC7v

They'll just end up as overcrowding. There are already flats that small and many nearly as.

By all means build very small homes where people want that size. They are usually built that small to maximise profits at the cost of quality of life.

And to think that in the 1990s, huge single-family houses were built, especially in rural Poland.

I don't see any problem. Poland is a democracy and the government does what the voters want. Simple.

And in this case they don't want rabbit hut hes and therefore the local councillors they elected said no.

So the system works as intended.

It does in this case since the council are proactive.

That is far from universal.

Have you seen the T Pot house in Poland ?
msn.com/en-us/money/news/teapot-house-in-poland/vi-BB1oOdEo

A house rather than housing.

It's had quite a bit of publicity and was built by a local artist. It probably won't last that long but is fun to see.

bydgoszcz.naszemiasto.pl/dom-jak-czajnik-stoi-w-makowiskach-pod-bydgoszcza-zobaczcie/ar/c7-8778181

Here are the couple who built it.

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  IMG_0744_11zon.jpeg
  

Is it possible to live in this house? Is this a tiny house, fully functional?

Looks like it. The article explains more.

There's a company in Britain that makes houses of a similar size shaped like igloos and made of recycled rubber from car tyres. A small one is fine for one person, a two storey one is ok for a small family and you can connect them with others as your family grows.

I'd feel claustrophobic however in a lot of the world, people live in homes smaller than that.

And they're easy to demolish. Since 2000, there have been too many suburban looking bungalows in Poland with no architectural merit but unfortunately well built and therefore a hassle to replace with something better.

The problem with tiny houses is that people are collectors by nature. That's why houses usually have garages (with no room for cars), basements and other outbuildings full of junk.