The scope of our paper is to analyze housing policies implemented after the crisis in relation to their potential to prevent housing deprivation, displacement, and eviction. We will focus on Italy and Greece and on their capital cities, Rome and Athens, severely impacted by seven years of austerity policies and housing distress. Austerity assumes different forms and is impacting Italy and Greece in different ways. A common point for departure in this comparative paper is that these countries well exemplify the terms of the (new) housing crisis and the ‘intensification’ of a problem affecting many communities around Europe. Housing scholars seem to agree that the crucial point of the (new) housing crisis is not related to lack of supply, but rather to the erosive effects of impoverishment, unemployment, and indebtedness that challenge access to housing and, even worst, threaten eviction tenants in rental housing as well as homeowners with mortgages.

The paper explores the most recent innovations in housing policies in Rome, Italy and Athens, Greece, assuming a specific focus on durable tenancy and housing stability considered to be fundamental components for the prevention of displacement (European Commission 2016). Also international studies on how to prevent eviction, displacement and homelessness have proven the importance of housing policies and prevention measures as a way to face the current increase of housing deprivation (FEANSA 2011, 2007). Rome is a special case in the geography of the Italian housing crisis. It is the city with the larger number of eviction orders, the highest social housing demand, the richer public residential stock, the longer housing movement