Rents are soaring and affordable homes are scarce. How are Europe’s cities fighting back against the housing crisis?

In the European Union's most populous city, pressure on the housing market is so great that many of its residents are willing to undertake a historic experiment: Five years ago, Berliners voted in a referendum to instruct the Senate of the German capital to draft a law that would put an end to the power of large real estate companies. Those that owned more than 3,000 units should be expropriated, they said. The Senate did not act on the results of the referendum, which was non-binding. Meanwhile, the average cost of new leases has since risen by about half. But in the Berlin elections on September 20, the socialist Left Party , which in its campaign had promised to act on the referendum, won the largest share of the vote.