41 Articles The Potential of Social Rental Agencies within Social Housing Provision in Post- Socialist Countries: The Case of Hungary József Hegedüs, Vera Horváth and Eszter Somogyi Metropolitan Research Institute, Budapest, Hungary > Abstract_ The aim of this paper is to propose a new social housing model as a possible response to the housing crisis in post-socialist transition countries. We will review social housing programmes in developed societies that aim to use the private rental sector for public purposes, giving particular attention to Social Rental Agencies. We then present the case of Hungary, where, after decades of privatisa- tion, the social housing stock is low by European standards, while the need for affordable housing is considerable – a common situation in post-socialist countries. In Hungary, triggered by an urgent housing need on the one hand and a lack of resources and adequate political support on the other, local public and non-profit organisations have been experimenting with innovative solutions to provide secure accommodation in a context of limited financial means. Although these small-scale initiatives have yielded compelling results, their examples are limited and they have not been expanded to a larger national policy in a way that adequately addresses the wider lack of affordable housing. Our proposal is for Social Rental Agencies (SRAs), which integrate elements of existing innovative housing programmes and international best practice; if the scale of existing programmes could be expanded, these could offer a relatively low-cost solution to address this housing need. 1 > Keywords_ Post-soviet housing policy, private rented sector, social housing, social rental agencies, politics and housing policy 1 This paper is based on two research projects undertaken by the Metropolitan Research Institute: a) EU FP7-funded research project TENLAW (Tenancy Law and Housing Policy in Multi-level Europe) and b) Introducing Social Rental Agencies in Hungary: a joint project with Habitat for Humanity Hungary, funded by the Open Society Foundations. Our analysis focuses on the case of Hungary but is applicable to a number of post-socialist EU Member States, e.g., the Visegrad 4 countries, the Baltic states or Slovenia. ISSN 2030-2762 / ISSN 2030-3106 online