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Paper short abstract:

This presentation tries to explain why, facing impoverishment or irregular incomes, rent tends to be sacrificed as a budget heading or to be used as a temporary adjustement variable by low-incomes families. The analysis contributes to a reflection on the social structure of these households' indebtedness.

Paper long abstract:

In France the number of households who fall behind in rent have considerably increased in recent years. For instance, the number of cases that came to court for rent debt reached 147 667 in 2012, representing a 25% increase since 2001. This evolution is generally viewed as a result of two combined factors : stagnant or declining incomes (due to a lay-off, a disease, etc.) and rising housing costs. This general perspective underlines the structural constraints which bear on households and facilitate the increase of rent debts. However, it ignores the different ways that low-income families react to impoverishment, and it underestimates the scale and the role of the households' budgetary practices in the emergence of this particular kind of indebtness. This presentation tries to explain why, facing impoverishment or irregular incomes, rent tends to be sacrificed as a budget heading or to be used as a temporary adjustement variable by low-incomes families. The analysis relies on an ethnographic research conducted among the debt recollection department of an important public-housing landlord in the Paris suburbs. Debt recollection work provides indeed an original point of view on budgetary practices of low-incomes households who fall behind in rent. By analyzing the specificty of rent arrears as a way for low-incomes families to gain some financial flexibility, this presentation contributes more broadly to a reflection not only on the amounts impoverished families owe, but also on the social structure of these households' indebtedness.