Mortgages

Mortgages are in the news; however, it's interesting to note that house ownership didn't really take off in the UK till after WWII and the house building policies that were introduced.

We tend to think that home ownership is quite high in the UK when we are compared to the rest of Europe, but the rate here is only about 63%, whereas in Eastern Europe it's at 90% or more.

During the transition from centrally planned economies to market-oriented systems, many Eastern European governments implemented policies to privatise state-owned housing. These policies provided opportunities for tenants to purchase their homes at subsidized prices or with favourable financing options. This facilitated a widespread transfer of housing ownership from the state to individuals, somewhat similar to the Right to Buy scheme under Thatcher, which is estimated to have resulted in some 2m former council houses having been sold, which swelled home ownership by between 5% and 10% - and is the reason why there's currently a desperate shortage of council homes.

Here's a list of countries by home ownership.