89 rue Henri Barbusse in Aubervilliers. This is an address that sums up all by itself these 2 scourges that particularly affect Seine-Saint-Denis: unworthy housing and that of sleeping merchants. The town hall issued an order “imminent peril” on May 20 because the building is in danger of collapsing. It orders the evacuation of this degraded condominium by June 8. Sixty-three residents are affected, according to the city.
A building in danger of collapsing
A few days before the fateful date, around forty occupants would still be without a solution for rehousing. The town hall claims to have been seized by 13 occupants for whom it would be able to find a solution. The CADA, reception center for asylum seekers, should also rehouse some of them. On the other hand, the owners and the other tenants, without a lease, will have to manage.
– Hajera Mohammad
“The problem, in the event of a danger decree, is that we can only offer an accommodation solution to those who have both an official residence permit and a lease. Those who do not have lease are considered without right or title on housing, that’s the law that says so. We in town hall, we can only function by respecting this law”, explains Véronique Dauvergne, the deputy mayor in charge of health, hygiene and sanitation in Aubervilliers.
“It’s all the difficulty of these degraded condominiums where you have rental, subletting, it’s always complicated to disentangle the true from the false, to know who gave the accommodation to whom”, continues the chosen one. She claims to have alerted the services of the prefecture to the case of those who risk ending up on the street. “We also offered them to call 115, it’s not the best solution, I admit it“, specifies Véronique Dauvergne.
“Two weeks to pack up our things, it’s violent”
A speech that is difficult to pass with Serge and Maëlle. The couple rents one of the small houses that this condominium also has, at the back of the courtyard. They live there with their three-month-old baby. Maëlle understands the imminent danger, it is enough to look at the electric wires which hang down, the holes in the walls and in the roadway, the failing pipes, the flooded cellars and the porch which threatens to fall. “We don’t want to stay in a dangerous place; but what surprises us a bit is that it’s not dangerous since yesterday, and until now everyone washed their hands of it and now we are given two weeks to pack up our things, it’s very violent”.
– Hajera Mohammad
Families victims of sleep merchants
Violent in particular for these many families who live in this building without a rental contract, for the most part, victims of slum landlords. “There is a great diversity of people, but what they have in common is that they are all precarious: there are elderly people, people with disabilities, pregnant women, people who have their residence permit, others not and today they are dazed, they find it difficult to realize what will happen in two days”confirms Serge, revolted that the town hall “do nothing” to shelter these vulnerable groups.
Every day, the couple will knock on the doors of the apartments to identify all the occupants who live there and warn them of the deadline, advising them to set up a file with the help of the DAL who supports them. See also the unworthy living conditions in which some live, like that of Sultana. The 6-year-old Syrian girl visits the 25 square meter two-room apartment with moldy walls, infested with rats and holes, which she shares with five other members of her family. “We have no hotel, no house. Where are we going?”worries her father Jamal, also worried about the future of his daughter, educated in the neighboring town of Saint-Denis.
– Hajera Mohammad
– Hajera Mohammad
Sharzad also does not know where he will sleep on June 8. This Afghan, who earns his living as a bicycle delivery man for Uber Eats, pays a monthly rent of 650 euros to his landlord who refuses to give him a rental contract. “I’ve been asking him for the documents for two years and each time he tells me I’m going to do them, I’m going to do them and nothing at all. The last time, he asked me for 2,000 euros in exchange for the document, but I still haven’t received anything. Now I ask him to return my money but he refuses”, laments the young man.
Owners ruined and soon on the street
Finally, there are honest owners who do not have the means to relocate elsewhere, like Nacira. She started packing, not knowing where she was going to land. “With a pension of 900 euros, impossible to buy back”deplores the owner on the verge of tears when she shows us around her neat apartment, which she had taken the time to renovate in recent years by installing new parquet flooring in particular.
– Hajera Mohammad
More surprising, the case of Thierry, who bought, six months ago, a 35 square meters at 130,000 euros, in this joint ownership placed under judicial administrator. The state of the common areas and the building did not scare him when signing. “The agency and the owner assured me that everything was going to be redone, that the work had been voted on and scheduled. I had planned to completely renovate the apartment. I thought it would be a good investment, with the Greater Paris, I will sell easily in a few years”. But he too will have to leave his brand new apartment. “At 57, close to retirement, it hurts a little.” And “when I call the former owner for an explanation, she no longer answers.”
– Hajera Mohammad
28,000 unfit housing units in Seine-Saint-Denis
In Seine-Saint-Denis, the unworthy inhabitant concerns 15% of the private housing stock, i.e. 28,000 dwellings. At least 80,000 inhabitants are directly affected in the department. In Aubervilliers, the town hall has 20% unsanitary private housing. At the beginning of the year, the prefecture launched a prevention campaign to denounce this scourge and alert the victims. A phone number Unworthy housing info has been set up. It is 0806 706 806.