Aedes benchmark liveability: what the deep dive shows that your score misses

The Aedes benchmark report lands in your inbox. You scroll to the tenant satisfaction score, see that the figures are in line with last year and think: that's fine, then. But that same week, your neighbourhood manager sits across from you with a completely different story. Recurring nuisance reports in two blocks, a stairwell that's filthy again every Monday, residents who say they don't feel comfortable near the back entrance after dark. Two realities, and your benchmark score only shows you one of them.

That's not down to the benchmark itself, but to what an average does. One score across your entire portfolio flattens everything happening at neighbourhood and block level: the areas doing well compensate for the ones causing friction, and it's exactly those problem spots that fill your working week. In the Aedes benchmark 2025, tenants rate the liveability of their neighbourhood at an average of 6.0, the same level as previous years. By comparison, the repairs process now scores 8.1. Liveability is therefore the theme showing the least movement, even though woningcorporaties (Dutch social housing landlords) have actually been investing more in it.

What the liveability deep dive in the Aedes benchmark measures

If you only look at the headline score, you miss the point of the deep dive module. According to the explanation of the liveability deep dive, participating woningcorporaties ask their tenants about four perception indicators, each on a scale of 1 to 10: safety in the neighbourhood, experienced nuisance, how clean and well maintained the living environment is, and how visible your effort is towards a liveable, safe neighbourhood. On top of that, the deep dive produces two organisational indicators: liveability spending per rental unit and staffing capacity dedicated to liveability work.

That combination is the whole point. You place your tenants' perceptions alongside what you actually spend on them. That turns the question from "what score do we get?" into "are we getting back what we put in?". The survey runs again this season: woningcorporaties survey a random sample of their tenants once between September 2025 and July 2026, marking the fourth year of the deep dive.

The gap between effort and perception

The most useful finding from the 2025 benchmark isn't the score itself, but the explanation behind it: roughly a third of tenants have no clear picture of what their woningcorporatie actually does about liveability. You can add budget and headcount without your tenant score moving an inch, simply because tenants don't see your effort.

That's why the indicator on how visible your effort is often the most interesting of the four. If you score low there while your spending per rental unit is above your reference group, you don't have an investment problem, you have a visibility problem. That calls for something other than extra budget: reporting back on what's happened in the neighbourhood, being present when residents are around, and handling reports about the living environment just as seriously as repair requests.

From benchmark score to neighbourhood priority

The deep dive only really becomes valuable once you set it alongside your own data. Three steps you can take without any extra research:

• Set the four perception indicators alongside your reports per block. Where low safety scores coincide with recurring nuisance reports, you've got your priority list for the year ahead.
• Compare your liveability spending per rental unit with your reference group. Not to cut costs or top up budgets, but to work out whether an outlier score comes down to effort or to visibility.
• Use the signals from your neighbourhood managers as an early warning. What they're reporting now will show up in the figures at the next measurement.

Aedes is also expanding the benchmark: from 2026, more steering options will be added, so you can compare results more sharply and translate them into policy.

Measuring is just the start

Pick one neighbourhood where the score and your neighbourhood manager's story diverge the most. Set the perception indicators there against your reports data, work out whether the sticking point is effort or visibility, and spend the coming months visibly communicating what you're doing about it. At the next measurement round, the deep dive will show whether it made a difference. That's more direction than an average 6.0 will ever give you.