Housing Programme
During the past years housing policy has been out of the focus areas of the government, the nation-wide housing programme, long term housing policy objectives and a vision have been missing. This led not to solutions, but to problems and measures that were mostly subsequent and with varying success. Within the frames of crisis management the home construction sector did not receive substantive resources, and in 2009 the current annual housing aids decreased to one twentieth of the former level.
The 2010 budget appropriation for housing was HUF 147 billion (about
0.6% of GDP), with the significant part of it serving for interest
subsidy provided for former housing loans.
During the former government term the adoption of Parliamentary
Resolution No. 36/2009 (V.12.) and other amendments to construction
administration regulations pointed towards a good direction, but their
implementation mostly did not take place, and the practical value of
certain elements (e.g. introduction of the system of security managers)
was criticised by many. The measures aimed at helping those having
foreign currency home loan, the regulation of residential housing loans
and the creation of the banks' code of conduct were of a subsequent,
alleviating nature. Announcement of tenders for housing supports was
mostly promiscuous, the efficiency of the tender system could hardly be
measured in the lack of set objectives. In 2009 the Green Investment
System (ZBR) programme was announced for the utilisation of the amounts
received from the sale of the CO2 quota.
The negative characteristics of the condition of the construction
industry are as follows: chain debts, lack of sources for financing,
unpaid invoices, crimes in the construction industry, frequently
changing legal regulations, requirement for exaggerating bank
guarantees, quality issues, temporary or final closing of factories,
collective redundancies, winding-off of several small and medium-sized
enterprises. The number of newly built residential buildings is
approaching a lowest point in decades.
For a significant part of the population housing burdens are
increasingly hard to pay for, and the lack of available housing loans in
HUF resulted in indebtedness in foreign currencies. After food, housing
expenses are the second largest expenditure items for the households,
amounting to about 22 percent of the total expenses (not including loan
repayments) (2008). During the past years the home maintenance costs
have significantly increased, in 2008 the population spent on housing
services, water, electricity, gas and other fuels more than twice as
much as in 2000.
Homes for the majority of people mean their most important property, a
result of a life's work, regarded by many as the foundation of a secure
standard of living. Maintenance of privately owned homes is not ensured
in several cases; the proportion of rented dwellings and the extent of
constructing rented dwellings are extremely low.