Housing evictions in Brussels: how many, who and where?

Abstract

How many households are evicted from their homes each year in Brussels? What is known about the profile of evicted tenants and landlords who have called for an eviction? Are some parts of the city more affected than others? Although they constitute an extreme case of deprivation of the right to housing, evictions from housing in Brussels are still very poorly documented. This article aims to address this lack of knowledge by providing a comprehensive snapshot of judicial evictions over one year (2018) for the entire Brussels Region. The results highlight the importance of questioning the lack of institutional data on housing evictions in a city where housing production and allocation is largely dominated by market mechanisms.

Keywords

• housing
• poverty
• real estate market
• law