2024-01-16 16:23:49
The number of vacant homes reached 3.1 million in France in 2023, or 8.2% of the housing stock, excluding Mayotte.. A number up 60% since 1990. The share of vacant housing is greater in areas experiencing demographic decline, according to an INSEE study published Tuesday. This increase occurred mainly from 2005 and has since reached 2.5% on average per year. The number of vacant housing units thus increases 2.3 times faster than the total number of housing units between 2005 and 2023.
As a reminder, accommodation is vacant if it is unoccupied and offered for sale or rental or already assigned to a buyer or tenant and awaiting occupation or awaiting inheritance settlement or without specific assignment by the owner (dilapidated housing, occupant living elsewhere for a time, etc.).
Vacancy is on the rise in almost all departments, with the exception of Corsica and Hérault. In Corsica, the vacancy rate, already very low in 2009 (less than 4%), is falling further. Only one other department is experiencing a similar development: Hérault, where the vacancy rate increases from 7.4% in 2009 to 7.1% in 2020, notably linked to its demographic growth, the strongest of the departments in mainland France ( +15.2% between 2009 and 2020).
Martinique, land of vacant housing
«The share of vacant housing is higher in areas with less population density (…). Conversely, it remains lower in the areas of attraction of the most populated cities, in areas with demographic growth or in those renowned for their tourist attraction.», analyzes the National Institute of Statistics, based on tax data and the population census. Housing vacancy is increasing further in the departments already affected. For example, the department of Orne, already affected in 2020, is still affected today.
The most affected areas are the overseas departments such as Martinique where the increase in vacant housing is strong (+3.4 points). In 2020, the vacancy rate there is the highest in France (16.1%), ahead of Creuse (15.9%) and Guadeloupe (15.1%). In nine departments of mainland France, the housing vacancy rate increased by more than 2.5 points between 2009 and 2020 and reached or exceeded 11%: Creuse, Nièvre, Ardennes, Cher, Yonne, Indre, the Meuse, the Orne and the Vosges. Conversely, the least affected areas are the departments located along the Atlantic and in Île-de-France (excluding Paris), as well as in Ille-et-Vilaine and in the Var.
Some elected officials scandalized by the vacancy of housing are proposing to requisition vacant housing to house the homeless, like Ian Brossat, senator from Paris. The municipalities would become decision-makers whereas today it is the prefecture which has the power to requisition empty housing.
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