For two years, Jianqui has lived in a 6 m2 apartment, rented for 460 euros per month. An illegal lease accepted due to lack of available housing within this budget. She testifies on BFM Paris Île-de-France, while a march to demand the requisitions of empty housing is organized this Sunday, January 5 in the capital.
At 63, Jianqiu has lived in a 6m² apartment in the 16th arrondissement of Paris for more than two years. A lease that the sixty-year-old pays 460 euros per month. However, current legislation prohibits owners from renting accommodation of less than 9m².
“This is my home,” she sums up, showing the tiny room equipped with a shower and a small sink. The toilets are on the landing. On a work surface she placed a kettle and basic cooking equipment. His belongings are put away and piled into bags and a mattress is stored against the wall.
“I sleep on the floor with this mattress every day,” she explains, maneuvering in the cramped space to place her mattress on the floor with difficulty.
Her meager salary as a part-time waitress, 775 euros per month, forced her to find accommodation in these conditions.
“With my salary, I can’t find a normal apartment,” laments Jianqiu. “In winter, it's not very hot and in summer it's very hot. Sometimes I don't sleep (…). I'm afraid of getting sick,” she sums up to BFM Paris Île- from-France.
Her accommodation being recognized as unsanitary, she was authorized by the authorities to no longer pay rent. A difficult situation to live with, which has effects in particular on one's mental health.
The tenant was recognized as DALO by the prefecture in February 2024, and is therefore a priority for emergency rehousing. The law provides for a period of six months but it has never received any proposals.
“For the moment, I have no choice but I hope I can be helped to find it quickly”
300,000 vacant homes in the region
The association Right to Housing is organizing, this Sunday, January 5, the requisition march from the Saint-Lazare station in Paris. A demonstration, launched in November, which aims to demand the provision of 300,000 vacant housing units in the region.
“The State no longer has the courage to apply the law (the right of requisition, editor’s note). It is necessary to save lives,” writes the association in a press release, which points to the commitments made in 2017 by Emmanuel Macron.
Droit au Logement estimates that four million people are poorly housed in France despite 3.1 million vacant homes. On the front line, the 330,000 homeless people on the national territory and the DALOs, households deemed priority under the enforceable right to housing , the number of which continues to increase.
The association also points to the 9 million m² of empty offices in Paris. A deficit which could be rebalanced thanks to the City's new local urban planning plan (PLU), which aims to rebalance the geography of tertiary real estate and social housing in the capital.
Chloé Bertod with Arthus Vaillant
