Spotlights

To be continued...

In the spotlight section, we take a closer look at approaches and topics that are or will be relevant to our work in Eastern Europe and our cooperation with Western, Central and Southern Europe. Such approaches and topics promise added value and solutions to the challenges we are trying to address in the areas of housing, urban planning and politics in our project and focus regions.

They complement the topics that have occupied us for many years and to which we are committed in the long term through our projects. In doing so, we strive to take as holistic an approach as possible and to consider the various topics in relation to each other rather than separately.

Property management & resident engagement

In most countries in Eastern Europe, property management plays a particularly important role, especially for multi-family dwellings. The rate of home ownership is high, but at the same time, in many areas there are no functioning organisational structures for property owners, most of whom are owner-occupiers. Cooperation, training and empowerment of property management companies and municipal staff can make a significant contribution to initiating change and closely involving residents. Working with residents is essential: they must become aware of their responsibility for the entire building and the common property. This sense of ownership is a prerequisite for jointly initiating and making decisions that enable preparatory or concrete measures for renovation, greater energy efficiency and lower energy costs. Training opportunities and various communication measures aimed at all stakeholders and decision-makers are an important lever. 

 

  • Training and further education for administrative staff- climate managers
  • Establishing professional and modernised administrative structures
  • Training and further education for caretakers
    Empowerment and strengthening of homeowners

Energy-efficient refurbishment & energy poverty

Energy poverty is widespread in IWO’s project countries and regions, posing a threat to the health and well-being of the residents affected. Combating existing and impending energy poverty requires the involvement of many stakeholders at the resident, civil society and political levels. The main goal is to significantly increase the energy efficiency of the buildings concerned, often starting with low-threshold individual measures that are part of a longer-term renovation process with further steps. Energy losses are then reduced, residents are trained to heat and ventilate more consciously, and the building sector is increasingly decarbonised. An important factor in this area is reliable, sustainable and affordable financing options and offers, making the involvement of public and private lenders and funding providers essential for progress in this field.

Serial refurbishment could prove to be a game changer, as the majority of multi-family houses in the region are industrially constructed, standardised buildings – making it obvious to renovate them industrially, i.e. serially.

 

Urban and neighbourhood development

A holistic and integrated approach is crucial for scaling up and ensuring the broad effectiveness of positive effects.

Although individual steps and groundwork are part of our projects, they are always embedded in a larger strategic and systemic context, which is prepared in parallel and developed and communicated with the various stakeholders. As with individual renovation measures, which are followed by further measures in a coordinated, long-term approach, individual buildings are considered, but in the context of their surroundings – neighbouring buildings of the same type, public spaces, streets. The focus is on opportunities to develop several buildings and an area together in energy-efficient renovation projects and, for example, to organise the supply of electricity and heat in a concerted way. The involvement and activation of residents and users throughout the neighbourhood is a key success factor for urban and neighbourhood-level redevelopment and modernisation projects aimed at increasing energy efficiency and sufficiency as well as climate resilience.

 

  • Training and knowledge transfer
  • Integrated neighbourhood concepts

Development of housing markets

During the emergence and further development of the property-oriented housing markets in Eastern Europe, the development of alternative housing options – i.e. an official and regulated rental market, social housing and cooperatives – was neglected in most countries. Today, the demand for affordable housing is enormous, especially in the countries of the region. The lack of municipal or private housing companies that could offer rental accommodation has led to the development of unofficial and largely overpriced, unregulated rental markets. Young professionals, university graduates and families in particular have little prospect of finding housing outside of home ownership, which in turn is largely owned by older generations and not freely available.

For several years now, IWO’s project activities have therefore focused on developing alternative, affordable and sustainable housing options. Of particular importance is the development of the structural and legal framework and conditions for establishing and operating of municipal housing companies that can also provide social housing. In addition, the legal and organisational form of the cooperative represents an alternative for both the restructuring of existing housing and the creation of new housing. The cooperative does not completely reject the traditional Eastern European value of home ownership, but rather reinterprets it as a sense of shared responsibility and ownership for buildings and residents.

 

  • New construction of rental apartments – affordable housing
  • Cooperatives
  • Development of structures and conditions for the operation of municipal housing companies