Housing Consumes Half of Tehran Households' Expenses

Official statistics on the income and expenses of households in Tehran indicate that families residing in urban areas of the Iranian capital allocated half of their expenses to housing last year. Some analysts believe that with the increase in housing costs from last year to today, this share has significantly risen. The website 'Didban Iran' reported that this amount in Tehran constitutes half of household expenses, while in Bushehr province, it accounts for only 21 percent of expenses. Although the data published by the Statistical Center of Iran is often viewed with skepticism by the public and experts, it still indicates that the economic conditions in Iran are approaching a crisis level. According to this data, the average share of housing expenses across Iran is 38.1 percent. Research by VOA shows that based on the latest report from the Iranian government's Statistical Center, the average housing price in Tehran has risen to about 80 million and 600 thousand tomans this January. This situation has led the Tasnim news agency to declare that housing loans in Tehran are ineffective, as with a housing loan from the 'Bank Maskan', one can only purchase about 3.8 square meters of a house in Tehran. This news agency, close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, emphasized in a report on March 20 that the government's policies have been 'ineffective' and have not led to public welfare in the housing sector. The decline in people's purchasing power is the main factor hindering applicants from obtaining housing. In this regard, in the summer of this year, the Research Center of the Islamic Consultative Assembly reported that until the early 2010s, the first to third income deciles were effectively deprived of access to suitable housing due to their inability to pay bank installments. Now, these three deciles are 'absolutely' unable to secure the necessary housing for their residence, and the fourth and fifth deciles, and even part of the sixth decile, are 'relatively' unable to provide the housing they need. Ebrahim Raisi, during the electoral campaign and after entering the presidency, promised to build one million housing units per year, but more than two years into his administration, there have been no achievements in this regard. The head of the Parliament's Civil Commission stated that the Chinese will enter the Iranian housing market starting from May 2024. The low share of people in banking facilities means that housing loans become a share of government projects. A cardiac arrest in the housing market; buying and selling of housing has stopped.