The lack of an affordable housing offer on the Metropolitan real estate market obliges poorer households to find refuge in bad quality accommodation which forms de facto part of the social housing stock.
Substandard housing was at first a common notion before becoming a legal concept. Nowadays, substandard housing signifies any situation in which the state of the premises, facilities or housing unit, expose occupants to health or security risks. Such cases are dealt with by police power acting under the orders of Mayors or Prefects, depending on the nature of the problems recorded. Situations targeted by this definition are:
- premises and facilities used for housing that are not suitable to be lived in (cellars, basements, attics…),
- the state of housing or of the building it is in which puts occupants under the obvious threat of health or security risks.
The Métropole du Grand Paris, including Paris, is affected by such cases of run down housing and poverty. In all cases, the improvement of housing standards emerges as a social and human issue on a par with housing itself, the presence of low income households being the common trait of substandard or intolerable living conditions.