A decade on from the GFC – Financial resilience and unaffordable housing markets

Abstract

The central theme to this paper is to challenge the idea that financial resilience has been built up in cities with unaffordable housing markets. In doing so, the research engages with resilience theory, arguing that the 21st century society is one riven by turbulence, shocks and stress (Amin, 2013; Klein, 2007). Resilience theory engagement is also with an argument that society is now one where we live in a permanent state of economic, environmental and social emergency (Wilson and Swyngedouw, 2014). The research method involves secondary analysis of quantitative data on financial resilience and unaffordable housing market trends. Further, primary analysis involves key multi-stakeholder interviews (2017), with senior professionals dealing with the affordable housing problems from an economic and financial capacity. An in-depth case study of Auckland, New Zealand, is used to demonstrate critique of financial resilience in a city with unaffordable housing markets. Findings include an interesting mis-match of cities being deemed ‘unaffordable’ for statistical reasons, whilst not being ‘resilient’ for institutional network reasons (Rockefeller, 2017). Furthermore, findings concur that Auckland’s housing market unaffordability may invoke a less financially resilient city. The study also indicates that a case study approach such as this does not necessarily provide a grounding for criticising existing resilience concepts. However, conclusions point towards resilience through unaffordable housing markets to be from: (1) more persistence rather than transformation; (2) limited room for stakeholder contestation; and (3) outcome driven approaches that simply purchase resilience. Risks of financial shock and emergency are seen to be permanently present as a feature of cities that have developed hyper-unaffordable housing markets.