A Right to Housing?

by Samuel Stein

A radical blueprint for universal housing meets an unflinching assessment of why we haven’t won—from the best-selling author of Capital City

In the fight for housing, we are caught between the world we know and the world we want. This book is both a road map and a reckoning. Drawing on his own experience of on-the-ground organizing, Samuel Stein presents practical policies for enacting a right to shelter, a right to a home, and a right to the city itself.

With raw honesty, he then explores why these visions founder on the rocks of political reality. He reveals the forces blocking our path—from the power of real estate capital to the inadequacy of our institutions—and captures the complex feelings of a left that has lost faith in the future.

Written in the heady weeks surrounding Zohran Mamdani’s historic election for New York City mayor, Stein frames the book around the stirring possibilities and structural constraints of a socialist administration in the financial center of a sputtering empire. He opens a space for action in the absence of hope. This is an examination of life and politics at the intersection of optimism and pessimism, nihilism and naivety, faith and doubt—an essential book for activists, planners, and anyone who refuses to accept the housing crisis as inevitable or immutable.

Genres: History, Urban Planning, Nonfiction, Urbanism

240 pages, Paperback

Published September 8, 2026

Reviews

[Sandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not certain how to adequately review this book, but I'm going to give it my best shot. First, I want to preface this by saying that I'm not a New Yorker, and I'm not American. I am, however, a Canadian who has worked with people living in poverty, with people facing homelessness, within a system that chooses, at best, to ignore the issues or, at worst, to vilify those impacted by the issues. It's frustrating. It's hard to find hope. It's hard to see a clear path from here to a place where everyone - EVERYONE - has access to safe, affordable housing.

With that said, the number one thing I took away from this book is that it's okay to feel hopeless or helpless. It's normal. It's natural. We should stop fighting it and give it the space it deserves. But - BUT - and this is most important, we can't let that feeling of hopelessness or helplessness stop us from trying, from speaking out, from doing the work that needs to be done to move our society in a direction where everyone is housed, everyone is cared for, everyone has what they need. We can't give up.

I pay attention to politics, and I've learned to listen to all sides, so that I have a better understanding of where people are coming from in their viewpoints. I love reading books from different religious perspectives. If I had to put myself into a box, I'd probably describe myself as a democratic socialist, as I believe in equity for every living being on this planet. We should be working together to ensure everyone is safe, everyone has their basic needs met, including housing, food, healthcare, and education, and everyone has access to achieving a life they truly love, surrounded by people they love.

This is the reason I chose to read this book - I wanted to learn more. I wanted to see what other ideas are out there for solutions to this worldwide problem. I have to say that the author did an excellent job of outlining all the variables, especially all the roadblocks to making change happen. I thought I understood all the intricacies, but I didn't. There were a lot of things that I just hadn't even considered. So, for that, thank you.

With that said, I found the language used, the words chosen, especially in the first half of the book to be less than accessible for the masses. I'm a university graduate. I'm a reader, and yet I had to read slowly and carefully, and sometimes I had to re-read a section to be sure I understood what the author was saying. I understand the book is based on speeches for specific audiences, but if I could recommend anything, it would be to write a book with similar intent and content, but in a way that is accessible to everyone and anyone. More people, more of the general population, needs to understand this issue better and I believe this author has the knowledge to make that happen.

This book is important. Its content is important. While it's geared specifically toward New York City, the issue is universal. I recommend it for those involved or interested in the housing crisis in their neighbourhoods.

[Jerry Edward Stephens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Significant housing policy issues include affordable housing, homelessness, and the local controls and regulation of private property. Some of the issues seem to be particularly unsolvable. The price of housing, its general availability, quality construction, and regulatory matters are among those seen to be most difficult to resolve. What we frequently see, instead, are rents that are excessive, buildings are decaying in many areas, and homelessness reaching historic heights. What other approaches can address this monster public policy crisis? President Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed a “second bill of rights” in his 1944 State of the Union address to Congress. Among the items included in FDR’s proposed set of economic rights was a guarantee of “decent housing,” a proposal often defined as a right to have safe, healthy, and affordable housing for everyone. The proposal has languished since without complete national or state attention. International law also addresses a right to decent and adequate housing. The pressing question of affordable housing has, furthermore, grown in recent years to be of significant concern to the American people. Samuel Stein, the author of this new book on housing policy, is also the author of Capital City: Gentrification and the Real Estate State (Verso Books 2019). He is a housing policy analyst at the Community Service Society and a trained urban planner and geographer. Stein researches and writes about the politics of urban planning with a focus on New York City, and with a specific emphasis on housing, real estate, labor and gentrification of neighborhoods. His work has been published in many prominent sources. From the book’s introduction, Stein addresses a two-part problem in the meaning of a right to housing and its component aspects. Stein suggests there are two separate considerations in housing policy: society certainly can provide adequate housing for all but questions will remain whether we will actually provide that essential housing. That duality is at the heart of the housing advocacy Stein has experienced. He sees the right to housing as a political, legal, and economic issue; but the right to housing also requires real incentive to actually achieve any meaningful result. What does the right to housing mean in practice? How can architects and other urban practitioners contribute? With questions like those, Stein explores how design and policy can confront the housing crisis and redevelop and reimagine a more just and inclusive city. Highly recommended for readers concerned about housing as a significant public and social concern.

[Annotations&Air · Rating 5 out of 5]

Housing is one of those things we say should be a human right, but A Right to Housing? really made me think about what it would take for us to actually mean that.

Samuel Stein looks at the housing crisis through the systems that created and continue to sustain it: real estate, capitalism, political power, and policies that have allowed something people need to survive to become an incredibly profitable commodity.

I especially appreciated that this book doesn’t pretend there are simple solutions. Stein is realistic about how difficult meaningful change is when so many powerful interests benefit from keeping housing expensive and scarce. There’s frustration here, and even some pessimism, but there’s also a real belief in organizing and collective action.

It also had me thinking about how often we talk about housing as an individual responsibility. Where someone lives, whether they rent or own, whether they can afford their neighborhood, whether they become unhoused. We spend so much time talking about people’s choices and not nearly enough time talking about the systems that determine what choices they actually have.

It’s a short book tackling a huge subject, and I finished it with more questions than answers. I mean that as a compliment. It pushed me to think more deeply about what we really mean when we say everyone deserves a safe, stable place to live, and what we’re willing to change to make that possible.

A really worthwhile read for anyone interested in housing justice, inequality, community, and the systems shaping where and how we get to live.

Thank you to Verso Books for the early copy for review.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting that this book was written during the 2025 elections that saw Mamdani elected mayor of New York! I read an advanced reader copy and hope that the author had the opportunity to add a foreword or epilogue to bring the situation current before publication. Even without it, this book is a solid look at what many people say they want to have happen, what many people think can happen, and what is actually happening. While I am involved in the LIHTC industry, I agree with Stein that it isn't the best answer to the problem. But it is an answer and it is helping address the problem and the guidelines around it are getting better (for the people who need subsidized housing). I can't say that I learned much reading this book, but that is more because of what I knew already versus the information provided in this book. While I don't think it would make for the best introduction to the subject, it would definitely be a good read for anyone wanting to further their knowledge of the housing industry.

Thanks to NetGalley and Verso Books for a copy of the book. This review is my own opinion.

[Frank Vasquez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always funny doing ARC reviews, but I’ll say this: necessary, informative, reads damn well. We need more revolutionary literature that can be made readily available for non-academics and academics alike. In that, Stein is here successful. I was able to read this in one day, and still come away from it with more references and organizing questions/discussion topics than were usually gifted by efforts such as these.
I could absolutely have done without the religious anecdotes, but whatever.

Thank you Verso for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. These opinions are my own.

[Benjamin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really inspiring, actually, to read that Samuel Stein often feels hopeless

[Ajk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read for a review to be published, just saving this for personal reference, please don't read/not read this book based off of this sentence.