Exploring Housing Policies in Five Swedish Municipalities: Alternatives and Priorities

Introduction
Housing shortage due to population growth within metropolitan areas, combined with an ageing population has put pressure on current housing provision policies in Sweden. Thus, there is an urgent need to develop sustainable housing policies to accommodate the growing number of seniors in accessible home environments. This study aimed to gain an in-depth understanding of how municipalities currently address housing accessibility issues and to explore what types of policy solutions they consider for the future.

Material and methods
Five Swedish municipalities were selected to represent a diversity of population, housing situations and geographical areas. Two key actors from each municipality (public officials, housing adaptation grant managers, city architects etc.) participated in semi-structured interviews (N=10). Data were analysed using content analysis, i.e. inductive category formation, described by Mayring (2014).

Results
Important themes included how such factors as the organizational structure of the municipality and the level of collaboration between municipal and private actors impacted the goals and ambitions of current housing policies. Emerging themes concerning possible measures and policies for the future were innovative types of housing and the need for economic incentives for older people to move from housing with poor accessibility to housing designed to better meet their needs.

Conclusion
Municipalities struggle with the lack of accessible and affordable housing for the ageing population. The results suggest there is a need to consider how to prevent organizational issues from hampering policy initiatives and implementation and how to improve collaboration between municipal and private actors involved in housing provision.