Toulouse: the new housing crisis is becoming worrying
A survey commissioned by the ObserveR indicates that the supply of new homes has never been so low since 2010.
The alarm bell is ringing. This Thursday, the ObserveR de l’Immobilier Toulousain, which aims to give a global view of the new real estate market in Toulouse and its Metropolis, published its survey commissioned from the company Adequation. And the situation is worrying. The new housing market is floundering. In the Toulouse metropolitan area, in comparison with 2019 (reference year), we observe in 2021 a very strong decline of around 42% in the number of housing units offered for sale, among the most pronounced in large metropolitan areas. At the national level, the drop is -13%.
Laëtitia Vidal, president of the ObserveR, specifies that the collapse of sales has plunged the Toulouse urban area into a situation of shortage. “This is simply explained: in 2020, an election year (municipal election, editor’s note), the municipalities are freezing building permits, constructions not being easy to get citizens to accept. The problem is that since then, building permits have not gone up again, it is in particular the fault of the cancellation of the PLUIH, ”she analyzes. If the number of sales remains constant, the stock of new homes will be sold in 6.8 months.
The consequences of this suffering market situation are already visible. The number of investors fell by 30% in the first quarter of 2022. This crisis is accompanied by a rise in prices. The square meter in the metropolis has gone from 4,200 euros in 2019 to 4,350 euros in 2021. This year, it has reached 4,450 euros. According to the study’s projections, it could still climb to 4,800 euros.
“We’re going straight into the wall”
The study indicates “that we are going straight into the wall”, estimates Laëtitia Vidal. The ObserveR urges municipalities to issue more building permits. “We know that this involves a significant number of infrastructures and that this is not the case. And the opposition of the citizens is also strong…”, frames the president of the association. It calls for strengthening renovation and reconstruction, in particular by densifying the city center, where the buildings are “relatively low”.
The number of new owners in new buildings should drop sharply. The tightening of borrowing conditions will continue to accentuate the desolvency of some buyers. To buy type 2 housing in metropolitan France, a household must earn 2,460 euros net, which corresponds to 28% of households. In 2024, the net income of the household to access the property must be 2,700 net.