Disability and Discrimination in Access to Housing: A Multi-Criteria Test on the Visually Impaired

We are measuring the effect of a disability situation, targeting visual impairment, on access to housing in the private rental sector in Ile-de-France region using a protocol that allows us to compare this effect with that of a North African origin of the applicant. Between June and July 2020, we responded to 1,000 property advertisements, which corresponds to the sending of 3,000 messages requesting a visit to a property. Even though we use a weak signal of disability, a situation of poor eyesight, we show a high impact on the chances of being invited to visit a property. The applicant who reports this type of disability has a positive response rate that is 7.4 percentage points lower than the applicant who does not report a disability, a penalty of about 15 % in relative terms. The difference is significantly lower to the one obtained when the fictitious candidate reports a North African origin through the consonance of his/her first and last names, which is 10.5 percentage points.