This indicator presents a summary of the main housing policy objectives as well as obstacles faced in ensuring access to affordable housing, as identified by countries that responded to the 2016 OECD Questionnaire on Affordable and Social Housing (QuASH 2016). While reported obstacles were simply summarised by country, policy objectives were classified according to 10 broad categories.

Housing supply is a key concern for a number of countries. 11 responding countries consider increasing housing supply or sustaining it at a high level as an important objective (Austria, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, the Slovak Republic and Sweden). Furthermore, 15 countries referred to the need to increase the supply of housing in one or more specific tenures, with the majority of them mentioning the rental market.