Housing Requirements, Hazard Exposure, and Resilience Costs: A Global Outlook to 2100

Yasuhiro Kawasoe

No 11451, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: Global housing demand is rising rapidly, yet the combined pressures of future population growth, climate-driven hazard intensification, and constrained fiscal capacity have not been assessed together for their impact on housing at a global scale. Housing is one of the largest components of household wealth and national capital stock. This study provides the first global, country-level picture of future housing construction demand and its associated costs and identifies where the needs for resilient construction are most urgent. The lack of high-resolution, globally consistent geospatial and demographic data has limited previous analyses. This study integrates Shared Socioeconomic Pathways–based population projections to 2100 with dynamic household size modeling, cohort survival analysis, and multi-hazard exposure mapping to estimate future housing construction demand and its associated costs under business-as-usual and resilient construction pathways. Global housing stock is projected to nearly double by 2100, reaching 4.1 billion to 4.5 billion units. Resilient construction pathways are found to carry lower long-term costs than business-as-usual in most regions, although not in high-growth, high-hazard regions such as South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Construction demand in most regions is projected to transition from growth-driven to replacement-driven by mid-century, suggesting that the decisions made today about how and where it is built will shape countries' exposure to natural hazards and their fiscal obligations for decades to come. The study further identifies 46 countries facing a triple burden: high future housing demand, severe natural hazard exposure, and limited fiscal capacity to finance resilient construction. The nature of this burden varies systematically by region, with Pacific Island countries facing acute fiscal constraints, Sub-Saharan Africa facing unprecedented volumetric demand, and South and South east Asian countries facing the highest hazard exposure. These findings provide a quantitative basis for prioritizing resilient housing investment, nationally and through international support, differentiated across regions and individual countries.

Date: 2026-09-15
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