Nearly 140,000 people suffer from poor housing, including 30,000 without personal housing, according to the latest figures from the Abbé-Pierre Foundation in Reunion.
70,000 people live in discomfort : no access to hot water, sometimes no shower or indoor toilet. Nearly 34,000 people live in so-called “severe” overcrowding., with two fewer pieces compared to the standard. Around the most serious situations, poor housing would affect at least 200,000 people. Four out of ten Reunion Islanders would be in this situation, against 2,4 people out of ten on national average. The Abbé-Pierre foundation also points out the insufficiency of emergency accommodation, while calls to 115 increased from 34,334 in 2020 to 59,240 in 2023, from 32,641 different households. Only 28% of these requests were satisfied during the year, and the application of the right to enforceable accommodation is not full and complete on the island. Resulting from the lack of housing, the number of precarious buildings has increased on the island (23,478 according to the INSEE census in 2020, +5,9% compared to 2014) and 17,756 unworthy buildings are recorded by the Agorah, an increase of 9,4% compared to 2008.
