Experts Group Meeting Report On Metropolitan Planning And Finance For Adequate Housing

The Metropolitan Planning and Finance for Adequate Housing: Experts Group Meeting Report, prepared in collaboration with UN-Habitat and Marmara Municipalities Union, has been published. The report presents the discussions, outcomes, and recommendations of the Expert Group Meeting held in Istanbul on 1–3 October 2025 within the framework of MARUF25, focusing on how metropolitan planning, governance, and finance can support the right to adequate housing.

Housing is one of the most urgent urban challenges of our time. Rising costs, insecure tenure, inadequate living conditions, fragmented governance, and growing pressure on metropolitan regions make access to safe, affordable, and well-located housing increasingly difficult for millions of people. Addressing this crisis requires more than producing housing units; it calls for integrated metropolitan strategies that connect housing with land, mobility, infrastructure, services, climate resilience, and social inclusion.

Prepared as a knowledge-sharing and policy-guidance resource, this report brings together insights from metropolitan authorities, local governments, academics, civil society actors, and international experts. It explores how housing can be advanced as a human right and a public good through coordinated metropolitan management, rights-based planning, and innovative financing mechanisms.

The report includes:

• An overview of the Expert Group Meeting and its main objectives,
• Highlights from sessions on multilevel governance, metropolitan housing planning, and financing for affordable and large-scale housing solutions,
• Discussions on the seven dimensions of adequate housing: security of tenure, basic services, affordability, habitability, accessibility, location, and cultural adequacy,
• Case examples and experiences from Istanbul, Bogotá–Cundinamarca, Barcelona, Belo Horizonte, Malaysia, and Albania,
• Key outcomes, takeaways, and recommendations for strengthening metropolitan housing systems.

The report is designed as a reference for policymakers, local and metropolitan governments, urban planners, researchers, civil society organizations, and all stakeholders working to advance adequate, affordable, inclusive, and climate-resilient housing at the metropolitan scale.