The average British home now costs about nine times the average UK yearly salary. In the US, the average house costs just 8 times the average yearly salary. This means that for Brits, it is significantly more challenging to buy a property, than it is for people living in the US.
This is certainly reflected in the homeownership rates.
In the US, 65.3% of residential properties are occupied by their owners and the other 34.7% are rental properties. The UK has a lower home ownership rate, with just 63% of all residential properties occupied by owners, while a whopping 37% of UK properties are rental properties.
Property ownership rates in the US and UK are pretty poor vs the rest of the world. The US and the UK rank just 52 and 57 respectively on the global leader board of homeownership.
Generally, the higher the homeownership rate, the easier it is to become a homeowner in a given country. So, you may be interested to learn what other countries might have to offer in realm of homeownership.
Whether you’re simply curious about global homeownership rates, or if you’re thinking of jumping ship and moving to another country to get a foothold on the property ladder, below are the 20 countries with the world’s highest home ownership rates.
The list of countries is sorted in order from the highest homeownership at the top. We’ve also included the average annual salary for each of the top 20 countries, as well as the average property price (price per square meter), to help you decide where in the world would be easiest for you to get your foot onto the property ladder.
The Top 20 Countries with Highest Rate Of Homeownership
| Country | Home ownership rate | Avg. Annual Salary (USD) | Avg. Cost per meter (USD) |
| Romania | 96.1% | $14,160 | $1,437 |
| Laos | 95.9% | $3,230 | $2,000 |
| Kazakhstan | 95.0% | $9,030 | $1,710 |
| Hungary | 91.3% | $18,078 | $3,906 |
| Slovakia | 90.9% | $17,485 | $5,253 |
| Lithuania | 90.3% | $12,845 | $4,456 |
| Cuba | 90.0% | $526 | $2,700 |
| North Macedonia | 90.0% | $10,668 | $1,874 |
| Vietnam | 90.0% | $3,300 | $4,817 |
| Croatia | 89.7% | $16,902 | $4,344 |
| China | 89.7% | $16,153 | $17,856 |
| Russia | 89.0% | $11,610 | $7,225 |
| Singapore | 87.9% | $64,010 | $20,337 |
| India | 86.6% | $2,150 | $2,395 |
| Myanmar | 85.5% | $2,400 | $956 |
| Nepal | 85.0% | $1,220 | $1,878.0 |
| Bulgaria | 84.3% | $22,800 | $2,799.0 |
| Poland | 84.2% | $21,018 | $3,950.0 |
| Indonesia | 84.0% | $10,089 | $2,843.0 |
| Taiwan | 83.9% | $50,671 | $14,812.0 |
How much would it cost to buy a home in each country above?
The cost to buy a home, depends on size and location. In the table above you have the cost per square meter for a city centre property in the capital for each of the countries in the list. Below, we have included the rough square meter sizes of various properties (based on UK size standards). To work out how much a whole property would cost, simply multiply the cost per square meter from the above table by the total property square meters in the table below. Now you will have a ball-park idea of how much a city-centre property would set you back in each country.
|
Property size |
Sq meters |
|
1 – 2 bed property |
60 |
|
3 bed property |
80 |
|
4 bed property |
100 |
Need to sell a property quickly?
If you need to sell a property quickly for any other reason, then selling via an estate agent may no longer be the best option because it could take more than 6 months due to the property market. The 2023 property market is very slow because of high interest rates on mortgages, resulting in less people buying properties. The solution? Sell your property to a fast property buying company such as Property Rescue. Property Rescue will buy any residential UK property, in any condition, within as little as 7 days.