4. Private and Community Housing

This chapter investigates the influence of the connection between the social and the private housing sectors on community resilience and neighbourhood change. The central research questions are: Is there a connection, and if so, what is and how it is expressed, between the populating of public housing and the occupancy of private housing? How does this connection affect neighbourhood’s changes, and how the residential preferences of the residents—belonging to various population groups—affect community resilience? The research shows that entry or exit of a group to or from a neighbourhood begins in public housing, and is carried out by housing associations that provide a housing solution. This process of neighbourhood change is supported by informal internal and external renting, or subletting, of social housing. Therefore, although the ‘push’ and ‘pull’ factors from and to Whitechapel are different between people and communities, the process-entering or leaving-begin first in social housing, and only later proceeds in a private ownership housing.