"Who is going to live in cities? Who are cities for?" Leilani Farha, the UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing, wonders a few minutes into the documentary "Push" by award-winning director Fredrik Gertten, on today at the Architecture & Design Film Festival (ADFF: NY) at New York's Cinépolis Chelsea.
The question comes naturally after a research reveals to her that in Greater Toronto in the last 30 years housing prices increased by 425%, but an average family income only grew by 133%. As a consequence of urbanisation colliding with stagnant wages and lack of affordability, more poor people struggle, while the middle class is unable to afford to live in cities.
Farha therefore embarks in this documentary in a tour of the world, to analyse the global phenomenon of the commodification of housing and consequent lack of affordability.
Yet adequate housing is a fundamental human right, a precondition to a safe and healthy life, also referred to in article 25 (1) of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights.
From Ottawa, where she is based, and Toronto, Farha travels to New York, Valparaíso, Stockholm, London, Barcelona, Milan, Berlin and Seoul, realising there is a common issue to tackle – decent and affordable houses are disappearing, while companies are buying land and properties, renovating them, forcing out the residents, killing the local communities, and leaving the properties empty.
In Harlem, New York, Farha meets a man who spends 90% of his income on a flat, but his 1.700-unit housing project has just been bought by a huge private equity fund and he may soon end up paying 3,600 USD per month, a sum he can't afford.
In London – where Farha lives the 2017 tragedy at the Grenfell Tower through the stories of survivors and witnesses – it is estimated that 80% of the properties owned by foreign companies are empty.
Companies buy these properties and conceive them as assets, as Saskia Sassen explains in the documentary. Owning these houses is a means to make money and the sociologist calls the financial industry "an extractive sector" comparing it to mining: "Once it has extracted what it needs," she explains, "it doesn't care what happens to the rest."
One of the main biggest players in the global property business – worth $217tn, more than twice the world's total GDP – is private equity firm Blackstone that bought properties across the US for almost $10bn and recently expanded to Sweden, rising rents and evicting people when they couldn't pay.
Farha visits housing estates, speaks to the residents, meets politicians such as Barcelona mayor Ada Colau and interviews economist Joseph Stiglitz. The Nobel laureate explains how the 2008 crisis played an important role in increasing wealth inequality as companies bought whole neighbourhoods, gentrified them, doubled or tripled the value, but never took into consideration the people living in them.
Italian Roberto Saviano, author of Gomorrah, a book that exposed the inner workings of the Camorra, who has been living under police protection for over 10 years now, explains how tax havens also have a role in the property business: "You buy things on the cheap with legal money (…) a restaurant, hotel or houses. Then you sell those properties to your company in a tax haven. Your offshore company buys those assets, bringing the money back to England, Italy or Germany. If you want to bring your dirty money back into your country, you must simply buy assets that you can sell to yourself at a much higher price than you paid (…) Companies don't want inexpensive real estate. They want to pay as much as possible, to be able to hide more money."
But there's also "legal money" being invested in the property business and it comes from pension funds, that's why Farha goes to Seoul, where there are some of the largest pension funds in the world.
Shame Farah doesn't manage to interview Blackstone's head of real estate, as that would have been a great addition to the documentary.
We do see mayors from different capitals around the world pledging to protect housing by buying properties or buying them back, but there is no real conclusion to the documentary.
There are indeed new developments in this story: Farha announces in the documentary the launch of The Shift, a worldwide movement to reclaim and realize the fundamental human right to housing and you can bet she will keep on fighting for it. Yet in some cases the biggest challenges she may have to face will be with the institutions: in "Push" the director shows indeed Farha reporting on her findings about housing to a group of delegates who are not listening, but who are glued to their mobile phones (one seems to be shopping for watches…).
The time has come for people to reclaim their fundamental rights, but also for governments and politicians to pay attention (rather than play with their mobile phones…) and become more active in fighting back housing speculation to avoid turning cities into empty spaces for ruthless, immoral and unethical practices.
"Push" is on today, tomorrow and on 19th October at the Cinépolis Chelsea, 260 West 23rd Street, New York, as part of the Architecture & Design Film Festival (ADFF). Today and tomorow's screenings will be followed by a Q&A with director Fredrik Gertten; Leilani Farha will join him as well on 19th October.
Image credits for this post
1. Push poster
2. UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing, Leilani Farha, in New York. Photo: Janice d'Avila.
3. Leilani Farha meeting residents in Barcelona.
4. Leilani Farha on official mission to Korea. Photo: Janice d' Avila.
5. London. Photo: Sasha Snow.
6. Local housing activists in Valpaiso, Photo: Janice d'Avila.
7. Real estate agent in Toronto. Photo: Iris Ng.