News item | 06-09-2023 | 15:33
House seekers on the rental market are less likely to be discriminated against. This is evident from the most recent results of the third national monitor of discrimination in housing rental, which Minister Hugo de Jonge of the Interior and Kingdom Relations, Housing and Spatial Planning sent to the House of Representatives today. Despite this outcome, housing discrimination remains a persistent problem. That is why Minister Hugo de Jonge continues to focus on a firm approach.
“Residence discrimination is a persistent problem that cannot be solved overnight, it takes a lot of patience. Combating discrimination therefore deserves our permanent attention.” says Hugo de Jonge.
Research methodology
Just as in the previous two national monitors, this study responded to more than three thousand rental advertisements from housing website Pararius on behalf of fictitious home seekers. In this way, it was investigated whether there is discrimination against profiles with a Moroccan or Polish-sounding name (nationality), women with a Dutch-sounding name (gender) and profiles involving a homosexual couple (sexual preference). In the period January 2023 – April 2023, 3,030 successful tests were performed. In addition to using fictitious house seekers, mystery calls have been used to test the extent to which a letting agent is willing to cooperate with a discriminatory request from a fictitious landlord. A total of 203 mystery calls were carried out.
Moroccan names are less likely to be viewed
The results of this third national monitor indicate a slight decrease in the discrimination figures. Whereas the previous monitor (2021/2022) showed that all the investigated profiles with non-Dutch-sounding names (Polish and Moroccan) had a considerably lower chance of being invited to view a rental property than people with Dutch-sounding names, this is now less the case . People with a Moroccan-sounding male name continue to have a significantly lower chance (18% less) of being invited to view a home than people with a Dutch-sounding name. However, there is also a decrease for those profiles compared to the results from the previous national monitor. The net degree of discrimination of the other profiles, i.e. the Moroccan-sounding female name, the Polish-sounding male name, the homosexual couple and the Dutch female name, were not significant. This means that they have no lower chance of being invited for a viewing.
Share of discrimination among letting agents still high
The results of the mystery calls show that there is less discrimination than in previous years. The share of letting agents who are directly or indirectly willing to cooperate in order to exclude people with a certain profile has fallen from 80% (2021/2022) to 73%. That is still a substantial part of the rental intermediaries. One of the tactics used by rental agents to respond to a discriminatory request is to present it as unimportant. This reduces the seriousness and discriminatory nature of the request.
Progress in tackling housing discrimination also through legislation
The 2022/2023 monitor was once again carried out by the Verwey-Jonker Institute. A new component in the third national monitor is the investigation of the effectiveness of the policy on combating housing discrimination. This shows, among other things, that demonstrating the effectiveness of policy is complex, but that the joint approach to housing discrimination may have influenced the decrease in discrimination figures. The approach to housing discrimination has brought the subject more attention and made people more aware. Awareness was increased, among other things, by the information and awareness campaign ‘Wes discrimination door’. The previous two annual national monitors and the local and industry-oriented approach, in which there was frequent contact with relevant partners on the subject of housing discrimination, also contributed to putting housing discrimination on the map. As well as the Good Landlords Act, which came into force on 1 July 2023. This law includes a basic standard for good landlordship in the form of general rules. These rules apply to all landlords and rental intermediaries and ensure, among other things, the prevention of discrimination. If this standard is not met, municipalities are authorized to enforce it.
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