Homeownership Rates by Country: Why Romania Is at 94% and Switzerland Is at 36%

Published on: August 6, 2026

Last verified: 6 August 2026. Based on the latest Eurostat, OECD and national statistical office data; measures differ slightly between countries (households vs population), as noted below.

Quick answer: Homeownership ranges from about 94% in Romania and roughly 98% in Kazakhstan to 47% in Germany and around 36% of households in Switzerland, the lowest in Europe. National wealth explains almost none of the gap. The post-communist world sits above 90% because state housing was privatized to sitting tenants in the 1990s; Switzerland and Germany sit at the bottom because renting there is secure, professional and socially normal, while buying carries high prices, high deposits and high transaction costs.

Homeownership rates by country range from nearly universal to barely a third of the population, and the gap has almost nothing to do with how rich a country is. Romania, with a GDP per capita around a third of Switzerland's, has one of the highest ownership rates ever recorded. Switzerland, one of the wealthiest countries on Earth, has one of the lowest. This page collects the latest figures from Eurostat, the OECD and national statistical offices, and then explains the history that produced them.

Homeownership rates in Europe

The figures below show the share of people living in owner-occupied homes, based on the latest Eurostat data (2024), with the UK figure from UK Parliament research and Switzerland shown on both available measures.

Germany is the only EU country where renters outnumber owners: 53% of the population rents. Switzerland sits even lower. The Swiss Federal Statistical Office puts household ownership at around 36%, the lowest in Europe, while Eurostat's population-based measure puts it at 42%. The two numbers differ because owner households tend to be larger families, so counting people rather than households pushes the rate up. Both are correct; they simply measure different things.

Homeownership rates around the world

Why post-communist countries are above 90%

The extraordinary rates in Romania, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Albania, Kazakhstan and much of the former Eastern Bloc are the direct result of a single historical event: the privatization of state housing in the early 1990s.

Under communism, most urban housing was state-owned. When those systems collapsed, governments across the region sold apartments to their sitting tenants, often for symbolic prices or through voucher schemes. Millions of families became owners almost overnight, at close to zero cost. Romania was one of the most aggressive privatizers, transferring the vast majority of its state stock within a few years.

Three further forces locked the pattern in:

A weak rental market. With almost everyone owning, no professional rental sector developed. Renting long-term is often informal, insecure or socially unusual, which pushes each new generation toward buying too.

Inflation memory. Households that lived through currency collapses and hyperinflation in the 1990s learned to treat concrete and land as the only reliable store of value. Property became the default family savings vehicle.

Family transmission. Homes are inherited or self-built rather than bought through mortgage markets. Albania, at roughly 95%, is the clearest example: much of its stock is self-built and passed within families.

High ownership does not mean comfortable housing, though. Romania combines a 94% ownership rate with the EU's highest overcrowding rate: 40.7% of Romanians lived in overcrowded homes in 2024, according to Eurostat. Much of the privatized stock is aging communist-era panel housing. Owning nearly everything and housing everyone well are two different achievements.

Why Switzerland and Germany are so low

At the other extreme, the two lowest rates among developed economies belong to two of the richest. The reasons are structural rather than cultural accident.

Switzerland (around 36% of households):

• Prices and deposits. Swiss property prices are among the highest in the world, and banks require a 20% down payment, with affordability tested so that notional housing costs stay under roughly a third of gross income. A CHF 1 million apartment, which is modest in Zurich or Geneva, typically demands CHF 200,000 in equity and a very high income.
• Renting is genuinely good. Tenant protections are strong, leases are stable and much of the rental stock is owned by pension funds and insurers that maintain it professionally. Renting for life carries no stigma.
• Tax design. Switzerland has long taxed homeowners on the "imputed rental value" of their own home, which historically reduced the financial advantage of owning. In September 2025, Swiss voters approved abolishing this system, a change expected to phase in over the coming years and one of the few forces that could slowly lift Swiss ownership.
• Geography of ownership. The national average hides a huge spread: ownership is above 50% in Valais but below 20% in Basel-Stadt and Geneva.

Germany (47%):

• After World War II, West Germany rebuilt at speed by subsidizing rental construction at scale, creating a large, high-quality rental sector that never went away.
• There was no mass right-to-buy program of the kind Britain ran in the 1980s or Eastern Europe ran in the 1990s.
• Transaction costs are high. Property transfer tax runs 3.5% to 6.5% depending on the state, plus notary and agent fees, which discourages buying early and trading up.
• Secure tenancies and regulated rent increases make renting a rational long-term choice, and roughly half the country takes it.

Austria (55%) follows a similar logic, with Vienna's huge social and cooperative housing sector keeping ownership structurally low in the capital.

The engineered exception: Singapore

Singapore proves ownership rates can be manufactured deliberately rather than inherited from history. About 90% of resident households own their home, but the route is unique: close to 80% of residents live in flats built by the Housing and Development Board, bought on 99-year leases with heavy state subsidy and mandatory savings (CPF) used for deposits. It is the mirror image of the post-communist story, high ownership achieved through continuous state supply rather than one-off privatization.

What a homeownership rate actually tells a buyer

If you are researching a market as a foreign buyer, the ownership rate is a quick proxy for how the market works day to day:

• Low-ownership markets (Switzerland, Germany, Austria) have deep, professional, well-regulated rental sectors. Renting first while you learn a market is easy. Buying to let means operating inside strict tenant-protection rules.
• Very high-ownership markets (Romania, Croatia, Albania, Georgia) have thin formal rental supply. Most stock trades between private owners, listings quality varies, and long-term rentals can be scarce in smaller cities, which is one reason short-term rental yields sometimes look high there.
• A high rate does not mean an affordable or accessible market. It usually reflects decisions made decades ago. For how the same countries look to today's first-time buyers, see our companion piece on Gen Z and the global housing crisis.

For context on what those owned homes actually look like, country by country, see average home size by country.

Frequently asked questions

Which country has the highest homeownership rate in the world?
Among countries with reported data, Kazakhstan leads at roughly 98%, followed by other post-Soviet and post-communist states. Within the EU, Romania is highest at 94% (Eurostat, 2024).

Which developed country has the lowest homeownership rate?
Switzerland, at around 36% of households according to the Federal Statistical Office (42% on Eurostat's population-based measure). Germany is lowest in the EU at 47%.

Why is Germany's homeownership rate so low?
A combination of a large, high-quality rental sector built after WWII, strong tenant protections, high transaction taxes and the absence of any mass privatization or right-to-buy program.

Does a high homeownership rate mean housing is affordable?
No. The highest rates mostly reflect 1990s privatizations, not easy access today. Romania pairs a 94% ownership rate with the EU's worst overcrowding, and young buyers in high-ownership countries face many of the same affordability pressures as everywhere else.

Keep reading on JanusHermes

An ownership rate tells you how a market works before you ever contact an agent in it. JanusHermes aggregates local agency listings across more than 50 countries in 11 languages, with the local agency's contact details on the listing.

For the rest of the data set, see average home size by country, the world's empty homes and how much all the real estate in the world is worth. On the decision itself, run the numbers in buy vs rent: the 30-year simulation, and check foreign ownership restrictions by country before you shortlist a market.

This article is general information compiled from the named statistical sources, not financial advice.

Primary sources: Eurostat, Housing in Europe (2025 edition) and EU-SILC tenure data (ilc_lvho02, 2024 reference year); Swiss Federal Statistical Office structural survey data on tenure; OECD Affordable Housing Database; US Census Bureau; Statistics Canada; Australian Bureau of Statistics; Statistics Bureau of Japan; Singapore Department of Statistics; national census publications for Vietnam, India and Mexico; UK Parliament research briefings on housing tenure.

Figures are the latest available as of August 2026 and are rounded. Measures differ slightly between countries (households vs population); see the notes above.