The rents of residential apartments in the Syrian capital, Damascus, and other regime-controlled areas are witnessing an unprecedented rise, reaching 50%, 75% and 100%. The system has been gradually lifting subsidies since the beginning of this year.

This high cost of apartment rents is reflected in the poorest segments of the population of the capital and its countryside, especially the displaced, who suffer mainly from a deteriorating living reality due to the loss of their jobs and property, and their having to rent apartments and work for low wages in the cities of their displacement, in addition to employees in the public and private sectors and students coming to study in universities Capital.

This crisis is pushing these segments to search for exits and solutions by various means, and these solutions and exits are often at the expense of their standard of living, privacy or access to basic services, and sometimes at the expense of their health.

Cellars and shops

Nour El-Din, 52, a displaced Syrian from the countryside of Aleppo, and his family consisting of his wife and 5 children, were forced to abandon their apartment in the "Kashkol" area in the Damascus countryside last month, due to the high rent of 300,000 Syrian pounds (85.7) dollars, an amount Nour El-Din believes that Providing it is almost impossible unless "if I and my family will stay without eating and drinking," as he put it.

Noureddine adds to Al Jazeera Net that he works in a car wash from 8 in the morning until midnight with a weekly salary of 35,000 pounds (10 dollars), which is limited to spending on necessities such as food and basic expenses, and pays the rent of the apartment from the weekly salary of his two sons, who stopped education in order to Support him with household expenses.

Nour al-Din and his family had only a few days to find an alternative shelter, so the man in his fifties resorted to renting a shop in the Zabdin area in Damascus countryside for a rental fee of 80,000 pounds (about 23 dollars), but the family's struggle to adapt to the new housing began early, because the space A narrow area that does not exceed 25 square meters, in which the boundaries of the bedroom overlap with the boundaries of the kitchen and the bathroom, and the furniture is piled up one on top of the other. Debt.

The family’s suffering is not limited to dealing with problems inside the shop, but extends outside it, as the nearest bread distribution center is about half an hour away on foot, and such a distance is far from the nearest shopping mall, forcing them to spend hours securing their basic needs.

Like the Noureddine family, there are hundreds of Syrian families who are now resorting to renting shops and commercial basements far from the markets, in light of the significant rise in rents for apartments in the capital and its countryside.

Some Syrian families were forced to rent shops to live in them (Al-Jazeera)

Rising rents

The successive economic crises and the deterioration of the living conditions of the Syrians did not prevent real estate owners in Damascus and its countryside from asking for exorbitant sums as allowances for renting apartments and real estate, whether they were in the city center or in poorly served rural and slums, citing the real estate sale law that the Syrian regime’s government began implementing on March 25 In the past, which provided that residential rental properties are subject to an income tax of 5% of the annual rent allowance.

Simon (43 years), owner of a real estate office in the "Bab Touma" area of ​​Damascus, believes that the rise in real estate prices in Damascus and its countryside has several reasons, the most prominent of which are the worsening prices of basic commodities, the depreciation of the lira against other foreign currencies, and the dependence of many landlords on Rent allowance as the main source of income.

Simon says - in his speech to Al-Jazeera Net - that "there is a wide gap between the per capita income, which does not exceed tens of thousands sometimes, and the amounts requested by real estate owners, even in slum areas, such as (Al-Duwaila), (Al-Tadamon), (Daf Al-Shouk), (Daf Al-Sakhr) and (Saqba), in which the rent of an apartment ranges between 200,000 and 300,000 Syrian pounds (75 to 85 dollars) up to 500,000 dollars (143) depending on the apartment and the region, while the rent for one room varies in the areas of old Damascus (Bab Touma, Bab Sharqi, and Qaymariya). Between 250 and 350 thousand pounds (from 71 to 100 dollars), and of course some of these numbers are equal to 4 and 5 times the employee’s salary.”

Simon adds that "in the most organized areas closest to the city center, these numbers increase exponentially, bringing the price of the rented property in (Mazzeh), (Maysat) and (Shahbandar) to one million pounds per month (286 dollars), while the price increases in areas such as (Al-Malik). and (Abu Rumana) and (Dummar Project) to range between 500,000 and 2 million pounds (from 143 to 572 dollars).

Simon explains that real estate owners are victims of the economic reality in the country, as is the case of tenants, and that they freeze huge money in apartments and shops, sometimes amounting to one billion Syrian pounds per property, with a monthly rent allowance that does not exceed 1% of the value of the frozen capital, which negatively affects their investment.

As a result of the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Syrians to Damascus and its countryside from their devastated areas over the past ten years, the level of demand for real estate has become many times the level of its supply.

This is an added reason to the reasons for the rise in apartment rents, according to Simon.

It is noteworthy that the governorates of Damascus and Rif Dimashq are among the governorates that have received the most displaced people in regime-controlled areas since the outbreak of the war in the country in 2012, as they alone host more than one million out of about 7 million internally displaced people, according to a United Nations report.

There is a wide gap between per capita income and the amounts requested by real estate owners (Al-Jazeera)

bare houses

In addition to the shops and commercial basements, many Syrian families who found themselves threatened with eviction overnight, as they were unable to pay the rent, resort to renting apartments that are not covered or equipped with basic services (electrical and sanitary supplies) to prevent them from sleeping in the open.

And Badour's family, 37 years, displaced from Albukamal and mother of two daughters, is one of those families that ended up in an "uncovered" house in Al-Maliha area in Damascus countryside, after the rent of their apartment doubled in the past few months.

"Badur" (a pseudonym) and her two daughters are facing in their current apartment a tragic reality, as there is no electrical supply in the apartment, no heating method, and no doors or windows to prevent them from the harsh winter cold, while "Badur" is forced to light some firewood in a "metal tin" on a balcony. The apartment is so you can cook, wash and heat the water.

The majority of these apartments are located in slum areas, where basic services are barely reached, such as electric current, telephone lines and drinking water, which doubles the suffering of those families who are striving for stability and survival in light of the severe economic crisis that the country is going through.

Today, 90% of Syrians live below the poverty line, according to the World Food Programme, while about 12 million and 400,000 people - about 60% of the Syrian population - suffer from food insecurity.

Privacy vs Shelter

The disastrous effects of the housing crisis are not limited to the displaced from the various devastated Syrian regions to Damascus and its countryside, but also affect employees in the public and private sectors, in addition to students coming from different governorates to pursue their studies in Damascus universities.

The family of the government employee, Hani, 29, and his brother's family live in one apartment whose area does not exceed 60 square metres. Although the two families' sharing of the apartment contributes to saving money, they are deprived of the lowest levels of privacy that each family's life requires.

Hani told Al Jazeera Net, "I sit with my wife and three children in one room. My sons can only study during their infant brother's sleeping hours. As for engaging in private conversations with my wife, it is impossible with 9 people living in the house."

These solutions have recently become popular among the families most affected by the wave of rising rent costs for apartments, to ease the financial burdens on families and ensure a better quality of life.

As for Saba (24 years), a student at the Faculty of Informatics Engineering at the University of Hamak in Damascus, she was forced to stop her university shift at the beginning of this semester to work full-time as a waitress in the café next to her rented room in Bab Sharqi neighborhood to secure the rent, after her family became unable to help her. In his payment, coinciding with the landlord’s request for an increase of 50,000 pounds, the room rent became 250 thousand per month (about 72 dollars).

It is noteworthy that the average salaries for employees in the public sector will reach 110,000 pounds (about 31 dollars) starting from the beginning of next year, according to a recent presidential decree, while the minimum wage in the private sector will remain 90,000 pounds (about 26 dollars), which are not enough to rent One room in random areas, whether in Damascus or its countryside.