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Urban development councilor Arild Hermstad has grown tired of “complaining” about developers.
The increasingly hot real estate market in Oslo is creating steep fronts between developers and authorities. The developers say the municipality is constantly putting off and making housing more expensive. Grethe Meier at Privatmegleren recently issued a warning that house prices in Oslo could rise by as much as 25-30 percent over the next two years.
According to the developers, the problem is that very few homes are on the market. And they blamed the municipality.
NOW IT’S HOT: Grethe Meier at Privatmegleren believes Oslo politicians and the construction industry should meet as soon as possible to resolve the housing pressure in the capital.
Photo: Johnny Vaet Nordskog
– I’m afraid they don’t understand how seriously they are putting Oslo now. It is one thing that we have fewer people entering the market and even more pressure on prices. But all the research indicates that the real and adequate workforce is not being obtained, because they cannot afford to live there. This is also unfortunate for the business community, Meier told Nettavisen.
In particular, developers and brokers have asked for cheaper and smaller apartments, and would prefer to remove the minimum standard of 35 square meters.
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MDG: – Stop sewing
But Urban Development Councilor Arild Hermstad (MDG) thinks this is wrong and wants developers to roll up their sleeves and make an effort instead of complaining to the media.
– It is completely irrelevant for us to relax the requirements. The apartment rule is that we want people to also live in the city center. There should not be a transit point and all districts should have mixed housing. If we are going to start looking through our fingers for quality, it will go beyond people, Hermstad tells Nettavisen.
The city council believes that it has regulated many more parcels than the old bourgeois city council.
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– Case processing time is shorter in Oslo than in Asker and Bærum. There are 10,000 homes that are regulated and can be built now. So we have many opportunities. In total, our regulatory reserve is 27,000 homes. But we depend on the industry to take a stand, Hermstad says, and it comes with a direct challenge for developers:
– Can you have various concepts that make it easier for first-time founders to get an apartment, such as Obos’s concepts of start-up and partial ownership? the municipality also wants to do something, but there are pilot projects. We depend on the industry coming up with more projects targeting those in need of housing, Hermstad says.
A recurring theme is builders who are in long-term conflict with the Planning and Construction Agency (PBE). The municipality claims it is because developers are trying to seize opportunities to earn more money, while developers claim PBE is boxy and slow.
– We have a predictable policy. In some cases, the developers try to push more than is justifiable in the plots. My advice is to listen to PBE more. PBE manages a set of rules that politicians have adopted. That is their job.
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The general conflict is between developers who want to build quickly, easily, and small to get as many apartments as possible. The municipality, for its part, believes that they want to build good living environments, and it consists of more than small apartments.
There are big projects underway in Oslo, which will expand the city much more.
– You need schools, kindergartens and residences and other common functions when new areas are built. Hovinbyen, where there may be 40,000 new homes, is undergoing a complete transformation. It is not so simple that only a large amount of area can be designed for housing construction, we must also have public transport and plans that guarantee parks and good living environments, says Hermstad.
– What should the industry do?
– Sew a little less and do a little more. Much of the industry does a good job and seeks to generate good concepts. But part of the industry should definitely complain less, he says.
Grethe Meier in the private corridor has called for a separate urgent plan to build as many houses as possible, to avoid a runaway rise in prices.
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– I think, in general, we have a good dialogue with the developers. We listen to the industry. But they often don’t think about all the necessary infrastructure around homes and long-term social aspects. If we allow ourselves to be pressured by them, it could be terribly poorly balanced urban development. We can’t just look at the short term, Hermstad says.
– But is it really a goal that as many people as possible should live in Oslo?
– Definitely not. Quick centralization comes at a great price. But keep in mind that many want to move to Oslo, and facilitate it in a good way. Fortunately, we have great potential to transform old commercial areas like we do in Ensjø and Hovinbyen.
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Hermstad strongly warns against easing the requirements for smaller apartments.
– What we see with small apartments is that quickly there is a particularly large backlog of non-owners. It is also often people who do not live in the city who buy these apartments, because it is easy to rent them.
He believes that the national authorities should change the tax system to get rid of the favorable tax conditions for those who buy a second and third apartment.
– Today, the tax system is very skewed, because profits are also made by buying apartments number two and three. It should be beneficial to buy the first apartment, but not apartments two and three, says Hermstad.
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