ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses some dimensions of the emergence, consolidation and transformation of what is considered one of the most important social innovations in Latin American cities: the rise of the informal city. It examines two dimensions of the conversion of social innovations of the informal city into market valorization elements. The first dimension relates to the individualization of innovations in the form of location preferences. A second dimension of this process of the sucking up' of innovations is analysed from the viewpoint of the locational capital' of the poor. In this case, a social innovation the informal habitat is converted into capital as a result of changes taking place in the intra-urban structure which valorize new accessibility factors. The informal real estate market is the mechanism through which locational factors of slum dwelling are transformed into locational capital, allowing the slum dwellers to enter a speculative game of wins and losses promoted by the transformations of intra-urban structure.
