Nonprofit Landlord Types on the Housing Market—A Key to Rising Displacement in Berlin?

Abstract

Displacement research emphasizes the importance of housing market processes and their consequences for tenants. In recent years, a lively discussion in housing studies has emerged around policy mechanisms to promote permanently decommodified housing and nonprofit landlord types. This article picks up on the two strands of research and links them to our own empirical material from two studies on the city of Berlin that respond to two questions: (a) What role do the different landlord types play in processes of displacement? and (b) To what extent are the management strategies of nonprofit landlords equipped to dampen displacement processes? Our results, which are based on quantitative and qualitative analyses, show that public housing companies, cooperatives, and novel shared homeownership models pose a significantly lower risk of displacement. Although these landlord types do not prevent displacement entirely, their property management strategies, their self-understanding, and their networks make it possible to identify housing policy levers to minimize displacement.