**1. Introduction**

The rapid development of cities in Poland began with the beginnings of industry, at the end of the 19th century, when the country was under partitions. The inter-war period, i.e. the years from 1918 to 1939, was the time of the formation of the real estate market in Poland and of intense changes in the housing market. The shortage of flats continued throughout that time, and many of the rental flats available on the market were of a very low standard [1]. In the literature on the subject, attention was drawn to the very poor housing conditions of a large part of the society [2]. The influx of people from rural areas to cities in search of work increased the shortage of flats. The emerging cooperative movement became one of the pillars of the development of the housing sector. On October 29, 1920, the act on cooperatives was passed (Journal of Laws of 1920, No. 111, item 733), which created the legal basis for the establishment of housing cooperatives. Pursuant to that regulation, cooperative construction was initiated as part of housing and ownership-construction cooperatives. During the existence of the Second Polish Republic, housing cooperatives built about 100,000 flats. Importantly, the activities of the cooperatives were aimed at the needs of poorer people, who had been exploited by the owners of tenement houses. The estates were to meet high social standards, include playgrounds, schools, recreation places, cultural centers, cooperative shops

and bars, or canteens. There were also cooperatives providing housing for intellectuals (officials, teachers) [3]. An alternative idea for the development of housing in Poland was the adoption of the concept of the legal separation of premises. On October 24, 1934, the Ordinance of the President of the Republic of Poland on the ownership of premises was issued (Journal of Laws of 1934, No. 94, item 848). It made it possible to separate premises within buildings and sell them freely, resulting in the creation of housing communities. However, the lack of wide access to loans meant that until the end of the interwar period, separate ownership of premises remained a sporadic phenomenon [4].

After the Second World War, the reconstruction and development of the housing stock were the basic challenges for the liberated country. The destroyed buildings were rebuilt and new ones were built. In Poland, called the Polish People's Republic (PRL), a vision of a socialist state was implemented, in which private property was treated as a relic of the pre-war system. For this reason, the owners of tenement houses that had survived the war or were rebuilt after the war, were deprived of the possibility of renting them freely. The institution of rental control was introduced as part of the public housing economy [5]. It consisted in the fact that the state authorities decided who was to occupy premises in private tenement houses, without the will of their owners. The tenant received an administrative decision, under which he was allocated an flat or a part of the flat, e.g. one room only. In this way, two or even three families were often accommodated in large flats. This system of administrative lease regulation was maintained in Poland for a very long time, and even in the 1990s, many premises were occupied by council tenants.

The people's authority fought against private property and legal regulations introduced control of real property transactions. In the nineteen sixties, control was focused on the development of cooperatives, recognizing that this was the right way to increase the number of flats on the market. Housing cooperatives were established in each locality and only they were permitted to build multi-family buildings with the help of state-owned construction companies. Private construction companies did not exist at that time. The free market did not exist and construction processes were centrally controlled within the model of the command-and-control economy. Anyone who wanted to get an flat had to join a housing cooperative and wait, sometimes for many years, for the flat to be allocated. The final cost of building flats was borne by their tenants - members of housing cooperatives, who had to pay for the so-called housing contribution (key money). This shifted the burden of financing the construction of new buildings from the state to members of housing cooperatives [6]. In the nineteen seventies, more than 123,400 cooperative flats were completed [7], which was a record number. The cooperative housing estates built in different towns looked very similar: the same technology and uniform designs were used. The socialist states at that time adopted the large slab (a method of constructing buildings, consisting in assembling them on the construction site from large-size prefabricated concrete or reinforced concrete elements) as the basic form of housing construction [8]. During that period, numerous prefabricated buildings were erected in Poland and the number of flats increased quite significantly, although there were still too few of them in relation to the needs. Individual construction was marginalized, only repetitive designs with specific parameters were allowed. The area of the house could not exceed 110 m2.

Company flats were a characteristic element of the housing reality of the Polish People's Republic. They were built close to workplaces, and the assignments were usually given to employees with long-term employment. They were part of the property of a given workplace. They were, depending on the size of the enterprise, single blocks of flats or even entire estates built up with residential buildings and infrastructure. A company flat was usually the only alternative to a cooperative flat.
