Phil Hubbard

ABSTRACT Legal geography scholarship has repeatedly shown that normative visions of property are constructed through standards, policies and legislation promoting the single-family home as an ideal type. In turn, this privileging of the family home relies upon other forms of land use being defined as potentially injurious to those who live in single-family homes. One example here is accommodation occupied by students, a population assumed to share housing on a different basis than a “family”.

Introduction Since the onset of industrialisation and widespread urbanisation, it has been noted that home sizes, measured by floorspace, have generally been getting bigger in the global North even as the average household, measured by number of residents, becomes smaller.

Introduction Housing space standards have long been contested, with some believing market demand should dictate the size of homes, others that space standards are essential to maintain public health and well-being (Carr, 2016). In England, the 1918 Tudor Walters Act established external and internal space norms, enforced through insurance policies and government funding for housebuilders (Park, 2017).