The introductory chapter, written by editors Martin Grander and Mark Stephens, introduces the housing question as one of the most pressing issues of societal importance in recent decades. The authors summarize the problems of global housing markets in terms of accessibility, affordability, and residential segregation and argue that a deeper understanding of such problems requires the interrelationship between housing and welfare to be addressed. The authors argue for the application of “welfare regimes”, as proposed by Gøsta Esping-Andersen, which makes it possible to commence a deeper analysis in which distinctive housing systems can emerge in parallel to such wider welfare systems. The chapter shows that Jim Kemeny’s analysis of the relationship between welfare and housing regimes has recently been contested by both empirical and theoretical research. It is therefore argued that there is a need to revisit the connection between housing and welfare, considering changes in both the wider welfare regimes and housing systems. Thus, the aim of the book is introduced – to provide an empirically grounded and theoretically updated perspective of how welfare regimes relate to housing systems from the 2020s onwards.