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In the fourth episode of the series "Human 2040 " entitled "I live", we take a look around the house of the future. This new part of the series looks at the possible directions of transformation of cities and villages, as well as households. How much might the country's largest agglomerations grow? Where will senior citizens live? How will the current trend of buying property for investment develop? And also - what technologies will find their way into our homes? We can already try to answer these and a number of other questions - and it is these that the analysts from Polityka Insight have focused on. Additionally, Andrzej Bobiński, managing director of Polityka Insight, in a podcast about housing trends of the future, will talk to Agata Twardoch, architect and urban planner, assistant professor at the Faculty of Architecture, Silesian University of Technology.
THE SEJM HAS VOTED ON AN ACT ON THE REVERSE MORTGAGE OMBUDSPERSON (ROKOH).
Elderly people will be able to convert ownership of a house, apart-ment or land easily and safely into cash, which will complement their basic income.
The reverse mortgage act guarantees monthly minimum income calculated and indexed on the basis of market measures (e.g. price per square metre, location, type of real estate), rent control and defines the scope of additional benefits for seniors, e.g. medical subscription. The new institution and regulation will protect older people from exploitation, errors, legal loopholes and other adverse effects of REITs. According to experts, more effective control will significantly accelerate the growth of reversed mortgages.
The conversion of real estate into cash “frees” seniors from being tied to a place and gives them an opportunity to improve their quality of life. Many from rural areas and smaller towns decide to move to cities to live in special settlements for seniors. These are entire settlements, where housing is adapted to the social and health needs of the elderly. In addition to better care, they also provide an opportunity to overcome loneliness by sharing spaces with peers. The less prosperous are provided with social housing offered by the state and with social rental agencies linking seniors and enabling them to jointly rent their apartment.
After the crisis of the 2020s, caused by the collapse of the real estate bubble, affordable residential premises, tailored to the needs of Poles at every stage of their lives, can be found in big cities. Modern rooms in co-habitations for students and a growing number of single people are the most popular, with small apartments in the city centre (ideal for starting a family) and spacious apartments in quiet districts for self-furnishing at the time when children are born. Everything in the long-term lease offered by large, specialized companies (institutional leases) to-gether with a full range of services, including repair of equipment and improvement of the standard of the flat in case new technologies are developed.
Recent CBOS surveys confirm that Poles appreciate flexibility in housing matters – they do not want to be tied to one place, let alone limited by a mortgage for years. Respondents most appreciate mobility (59%), the possibility of rapidly changing: work (54%), living space (46%), city (42%) and even country (32%).
The adoption of the act will also transform the financial sector. The last boutique banks offering a product that was once universal – and today is niche – such as mortgage loans, will slowly become obsolete. Their role is being taken over by real estate investment trusts (REIT) and social rental agencies (SRA), which buy, invest, rent and manage housing. A growing source of revenue for REITs will be the reversed mortgage service.
CONTROVERSY SURROUNDING THE NEW BORDERS OF WROCŁAW IS INCREASING
The inhabitants of Sobótka and Kostomłoty have voted in favor of joining the Wrocław-Świdnica mega agglomeration (W-Ś).
The border areas of the largest cities are the most desirable residential areas today. On one hand, they are close to centers, ensuring high quality of services, public policies and access to a wide range of labor market offers, and on the other hand they help to avoid noise, crowding and other negative effects of urban life. For years, the administrative distinctiveness of Sobótka and Kostomłoty was a fiction – the towns were the “bedroom” of Wrocław, increasingly connected in terms of transportation and urbanistic ties with the capital of Lower Silesia. The referendum campaign invoked the example of Kobierzyce on numerous occasions, which benefited from joining W-Ś four years earlier, with inflows of new investments and enrichment of the recreational and cultural offer.
When the two towns were added the population of the lower Si-lesian capital exceeded 5 million inhabitants, placing it the group of two Polish “five million” towns – Warsaw and Krakow. Another metropolitan area, which may exceed this ceiling of 5 million is the Rzeszów-Krosno mega-agglomeration. Its government has special support programs to encourage residents of rural and urban areas, and areas at risk of climate change to move to south-eastern Poland. Almost 100,000 inhabitants of Lodz (fleeing high unemployment rate) and the Tricity (exposed to increasing flooding and deluges) have already leapt at the opportunity. The tragedy of shrinking seaside resorts can only equate to the drastic decline of medium-sized towns, where high unemployment is linked to the emigration of young people, bankruptcy and the collapse of public services.
The growth of major metropolitan areas leads to numerous political tensions. The role of voivodeship governments has been almost entirely marginalized. Mega-agglomerations are also increasingly entering into open conflict with central government. Given their population and economic potential, the leaders of the biggest cities are demanding a transfer of powers and a better distribution of tax revenues. Mega-agglomerations are also strengthening their cooperation with similar centers in other countries, increasingly bypassing the official diplomatic channels of the countries.
The power to attract major metropolitan areas makes smaller towns, as with rural areas, increasingly depopulated. Apart from industrial farming, they are inhabited almost exclusively by the elderly, who are emotionally and economically connected to the land. The low incomes of a growing number of elderly citizens translate into lower incomes for rural communities, driving the exclusion spiral and accelerating the migration of young people to mega-agglomerations. Despite access to state-of-the-art technologies, these areas are also “digital deserts” – digitally excluded elderly citizens do not benefit from technological benefits and live as their ancestors 30 to 40 years earlier.
8G AUCTION ANNOUNCED
The Vietnamese company Quoc-Tel has started work on launching another data transfer standard. The new technology will result in the dissemination of screen walls that enable filling spaces in the home and office with virtual reality.
A modern projector is the central point of almost every room – it allows you to work in the office, put children to bed, relax in the bedroom and provide entertainment in the living room. It is complemented by areas developed using organic technologies, which can illuminate millions of micropixels, creating a virtual reality – imitating an office, a concert hall or a cinema. This solution, which is common in the most affluent people's homes, has hitherto been treated rather as a whim and a sign of material status. However, with the adoption of the 8G standard, these devices will gain several new applications. The improvements in technology will also result in lower prices, which will speed up the increase in its popularity.
Intelligent screen walls are the latest act in the creation of a smart house. Previously, the technology took control of furniture or kitchen equipment. However, the wall in which smaller and better devices were installed and on which they were mounted often remained undeveloped, the last bastion of the twentieth century.
Miniature sensors placed on each object and device monitor the vital functions of household members. The biosensor of blood composition allows detecting diseases before the first somatic symptoms occur (e.g. insulin slump, infarction, virus infection), after combination with an external device, plans and controls all our day-to-day activities, including food, consumption of drugs, sports or sensations. It also optimises the temperature, humidity, lighting, and oxygenation of the room. In other words, it does not only care for the owner, but also their family, pets, and flowers.
The smart house becomes an environmentally sustainable place through optimizing the consumption of electricity, heat, and water to meet household needs and even assisting in the preliminary sorting of waste. Smart Grid networks and alternative energy sources such as home-adjacent RES plants and hydrogen systems are widely used. The surplus resources go back to the grid or to the battery of the electric car parked in the garage. In turn, software responsible for the supply of food products minimizes the volume of food waste.