A Lesson in Housing

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 910, 1 March 1930, Page 8

A Lesson in Housing

FLATS AT 71- A MONTH SIXTY THOUSAND modern flats for workers and smallsalaried men have been provided by the Social Democratic municipality of Vienna at prices which will make the Auckland City Council’s tenants at Grey Lynn green with envy. Instead of a weekly rent of 32s 6d —a modest charge in Auckland! —the municipal householder in the Austrian capital is charged an average monthly rent of about seven English shillings. How this has been accomplished is a story of civic enterprise far beyond the ability of municipal administrators in other lands.

The result of Vienna's scheme of municipal housing is that the Austrian worker pays only 3 per cent, of his wages or salary in rent. In Berlin, where public funds are also used for the promotion of building, the small man has to pay 25 per cent. Here, in most instances, the worker has to pay rather more for a lower standard of house comfort. Of course, in addition to a monthly rent of seven shillings, the tenant of a municipal flat in Vienna has to pay a housing tax of eightpence to ninepence a month, but that tax includes the charges of the concierge, light (in the staircase only), cleaning, chimney-sweep and sewerage. Heating and laundry service are separate charges, although the laundry costs are estimated at a shilling a week for each flat. Flat blocks with more than 400 tenants are equipped with a central laundry, with up-to-date washing machinery and central drying plant with steam heating. Each block of municipal flats in Vienna has a garden, and the big blocks are provided with roof-terraces, partly for sun-bathing, partly for use as playing grounds for the children. In a great many of the buildings (explains the Vienna correspondent of the “Manchester Guardian”) swimming baths have been built for children. There is a liberal provision of fountains in the courtyards, many of them decorated with excellent sculptures by first-class artists. There are special kindergartens for little children, each play-school being equipped in the most modern way. In each huge block there is at least one doctor and a dentist, for whom bigger flats, with suitable examination rooms or surgeries were built. HOW IT IS DONE How is it possible that the municipality can give these flats at such low rents? The Vienna Town Hall

calculates the rents in such fashion that only the costs of maintenance, and not of amortisation, are included in the rents. Even so, the rents appear remarkably low r , especially if we take into consideration that building costs have increased 70 per cent, over pre-war and that the interest rates on loans are enormous; the official discount rate of the Austrian National Bank is S per cent., so that no building loans can be had at less than 10£ per cent. But the municipality is building these houses not out of borrowed money but out of taxes. This reduces the building costs. The real secret of the cheapness of construction is, however, the collective buying of building material and the direction of building operations through a central office.

Material is bought at wholesale prices. Orders for bricks were placed for five years ahead, thus guaranteeing the brickworks ample occupation for years, and enabling them greatly to reduce prices. Thirty-five thousand windows and 25,000 doors are ordered at a time. Twelve architects were employed on salary, and similarly an engineer for every three buildings. Consequently the average cost of a flat with about 500 square feet of floor surface is approximately £340. Houses for one or two families work out at about £4OO each. Larger flats are, of course, dearer, but all are reasonable as to construction cost and rent. Out of taxes levied since February, 1923 (there is a heavy housing tax on luxurious flats and residences),.the municipality of Vienna has built 30,000 flats for workers and other strugglers, such as low-paid clerks, artists, musicians and sculptors. It has been planned to build 30,000 more before the end of 1932. A photograph of a typical block of flats, as reproduced on Page 5 of The Sun today, does not suggest the creation of slum areas in Vienna.