Ep 49: Sustaining and Growing Europe’s Social Housing with Sorcha Edwards

It’s difficult to sustain a social housing program, but it’s even harder to build one from scratch. Housing Europe, a coalition of social, public, and cooperative housing providers, is trying to do both. Sorcha Edwards, who serves as Secretary General of Housing Europe, joins us to share their efforts to expand the footprint of non-profit and limited-profit housing across the continent — maintaining established programs like those in Austria and Finland, and growing them in places like Spain, where only about 1% of housing units are rented social housing. We also discuss the International Social Housing Festival, happening this year in Barcelona on June 7-9, and the lessons and inspiration that can be drawn from practitioners around the globe.