How Hungary’s Empty Spaces Could Become the Future of Affordable Housing

Hungary’s housing landscape presents a striking contradiction. Despite a growing number of dwellings—over 4.5 million—more than 570,000 stand vacant, while nearly 3 million people struggle with housing poverty. At the same time, the country’s population continues to shrink, creating a disconnect between where homes exist and where they’re needed most. 

A new research study from Habitat for Humanity Hungary takes a deep dive into this complex picture, offering an eye-opening look at how a more inclusive, affordable, and sustainable housing future might be built—quite literally—out of empty spaces.

While Hungary is defined by high homeownership rates (90.2%), the rental market—especially in Budapest—is growing fast. However, the private rental sector remains underregulated and out of reach for many. The public housing sector, meanwhile, is both small and shrinking, with municipalities managing just 2.4% of the total housing stock. These same municipalities, though eager to act, are often financially constrained and face outdated regulations that make it difficult to expand or renovate affordable housing.

The study identifies a significant untapped opportunity: transforming vacant and underutilized buildings—both residential and non-residential—into affordable homes. These “empty spaces” include unused municipality-owned apartments, closed-down schools, vacant office buildings, and other underused structures. Yet, the road to reuse is far from straightforward. Regulatory bottlenecks, lack of financial instruments, and fragmented governance stand in the way of meaningful progress.

But change is possible. 

The research outlines four powerful, actionable scenarios to pilot the empty spaces approach in Hungary. These include empowering municipalities with new financing tools, fostering civil-NGO partnerships to renovate vacant dwellings, scaling up innovative social rental agency models, and launching civil-private developments that integrate affordable housing into mixed-use buildings.

Each of these strategies builds on existing knowledge and small-scale successes, signaling that Hungary doesn’t need to start from scratch—it just needs to connect the dots.

What’s needed now is political will, strategic investment, and coordinated effort. With a national cadaster of empty spaces, modernized regulations, and inclusive governance, Hungary could turn a structural challenge into a social opportunity.