How Many Years of Salary Does a Home Cost? Price-to-Income by Country

Published on: August 17, 2026

Last verified: 17 August 2026. Figures are quoted as published by the named institutions; the three measures use different definitions, as explained below.

Quick answer: There is no single answer, because three respected sources measure the same idea differently. On Numbeo's 2026 country table, the median country needs about 13 years of family disposable income to buy a 90 square metre apartment, with Nigeria highest at 93.7 and Finland lowest of the 100 listed at 7.2. On Demographia's median multiple, which covers only eight mostly English-speaking nations, Hong Kong is the least affordable major market. On the UK Office for National Statistics measure, the median home in England cost 7.6 times median full-time earnings in 2025. Those are not contradictions; they are three different questions, and the income denominator is what separates them.

There is no single answer to "how many years of salary does a house cost in my country," and anyone who gives you one number without saying which method produced it is guessing.

Three respected sources measure the same idea and disagree by a factor of two or more, because they measure different things. This page gives you all three, the full country table, and a plain explanation of why the numbers diverge. If you are citing a figure in an article or a policy note, the methodology section is the part that matters.

What price-to-income actually measures

Method 1: Numbeo (household disposable income, 90 square metre apartment)

Numbeo assumes a 90 square metre apartment, prices it at the average of city-centre and outside-centre price per square metre, and divides by yearly family disposable income calculated as 1.5 times average net salary.

Two consequences follow, and both matter:

1. Because the income denominator is 1.5 salaries rather than one, the ratio is not "years of one person's salary." It is years of a one-and-a-half-earner household's after-tax income.
2. Because Numbeo's price data is crowdsourced and skews toward cities where contributors live, national figures in large, unequal countries are pulled toward urban prices.

Numbeo is transparent about this. It is the widest cross-country dataset available and the only one covering more than 100 markets on a consistent formula, which is why it is used so often. It is not official statistics, and it should not be presented as such.

Method 2: Demographia median multiple (median price divided by median household income)

Demographia International Housing Affordability, published by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy with Chapman University's Center for Demographics and Policy, uses the median multiple: median house price divided by median pre-tax household income.

The 2026 edition, its 22nd, covers 95 major metropolitan markets across eight nations (Australia, Canada, China, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States) and reports on Q3 2025 data.

Its rating bands are worth memorising, because journalists quote them constantly:

Demographia's numbers are usually lower than Numbeo's for the same country, because it uses gross household income (a bigger denominator than net) and a median house price rather than an urban-weighted apartment estimate. On its 2026 edition, Hong Kong is the least affordable major market and Sydney is second, with Vancouver fifth at 10.8.

Method 3: National statistical offices

Where a national office publishes its own ratio, that figure is the one to cite for that country. The definitions vary:

• United Kingdom (ONS): median house price divided by the median gross annual earnings of a full-time employee. Note that this is one worker's gross pay, not a household's. In 2025 the median home in England, at 300,000 pounds, cost 7.6 times median full-time earnings of 39,300 pounds. Wales was 6.0 and London 10.6. The most affordable local authorities were Blaenau Gwent, Burnley and Blackpool; the least affordable was Kensington and Chelsea.
• Australia (Cotality): reported the national median dwelling value at roughly 8.9 times annual household income in 2025, up from 6.6 five years earlier, with a 20% deposit taking close to twelve years to save.
• OECD: publishes a price-to-income index, not a ratio. It is set to 100 in a base year and tracks the change in the relationship over time. An OECD reading of 130 does not mean 130 years or 1.3 years. It means prices have risen 30% faster than incomes since the base year. This is one of the most commonly misread housing statistics in journalism.

The full table: Numbeo 2026 price-to-income by country

Sorted highest (least affordable) to lowest. Values are from the Numbeo Property Prices Index by Country, 2026 annual table, price-to-income column.

Source: Numbeo, Property Prices Index by Country 2026, price-to-income ratio column.

The United States does not appear in this top 100, which places it below the 7.2 recorded by Finland at rank 100 on Numbeo's method. That is a useful corrective to the assumption that American housing is unaffordable by global standards: it is unaffordable relative to its own history and severely unaffordable in coastal metros, but the national aggregate is mild compared with most of Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Five things this table does not tell you

Anyone citing these numbers should carry these caveats with them.

1. National averages hide everything. The gap between Kensington and Chelsea at 27.1 and Blaenau Gwent at 3.8 is wider than the gap between most countries on this list. A single national ratio is a headline, not a diagnosis.
2. Low ratios can mean low prices or high incomes. Finland at 7.2 and Turkey at 7.3 arrive at nearly identical ratios by entirely different routes. Turkey's ratio also has to be read against its mortgage-as-a-percentage-of-income figure of 312.5 on the same Numbeo table, which reflects very high nominal interest rates. Cheap relative to income does not mean financeable.
3. Purchase affordability is not payment affordability. A country with an 8.0 ratio and 2% mortgage rates is far easier to buy in than one with an 8.0 ratio and 17% rates. Compare the mortgage-as-a-percentage-of-income and loan affordability columns before drawing conclusions, and see how mortgages differ around the world.
4. The deposit is often the real barrier. In markets with strict loan-to-value caps, the constraint is not the multiple but the years needed to save the down payment, which the ratio does not capture. Deposit requirements by country are the practical companion number.
5. Informal income and family transfers are invisible. In markets with large cash economies or strong intergenerational wealth transfer, measured income understates real purchasing power, and the ratio overstates the barrier.

Frequently asked questions

Which country has the highest house price relative to income?
On the Numbeo 2026 country table, Nigeria, at 93.7. Among high-income economies, Hong Kong is highest at 30.9 on Numbeo and is also the least affordable major market on Demographia's median multiple.

Which developed country is most affordable?
Among the countries listed in the Numbeo 2026 table, Finland (7.2), the Netherlands (7.5) and Canada (7.5) sit at the bottom of the top 100. The United States falls below the table entirely. Note that Canada's low national figure coexists with Vancouver at a 10.8 median multiple on Demographia's 2026 edition, a good illustration of why national averages mislead.

Why does my country's official number differ from Numbeo's?
Almost always because of the income denominator. Numbeo uses 1.5 times average net salary. The ONS uses one full-time worker's gross earnings. Demographia uses median household gross income. Larger denominators produce smaller ratios.

Is a ratio of 3 realistic anywhere today?
Not in any of the 95 major markets Demographia tracks. Not one of them is rated "affordable" (3.0 or under) in the 2026 edition. When the survey began 22 years ago, most of them were.

What is a good price-to-income ratio?
There is no official threshold. Demographia's bands are the closest thing to a convention, and its 3.0 line reflects a historical norm in Anglophone markets in the 1980s and 1990s rather than a rule of finance. Lenders care about your debt-to-income and loan-to-value, not your country's average multiple.

Keep reading on JanusHermes

Affordability ratios explain why buyers increasingly look across borders in the first place. 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 supply side of the same story, see the global housing shortage in numbers and the world's empty homes. On who the squeeze lands on, read the average age of first-time buyers by country and Gen Z and the global housing crisis. For ownership structure, see homeownership rates by country and what share of housing foreigners actually own. For what the money buys, compare what 1 million dollars buys around the world and average home size by country.

This article is general information compiled from the named public sources. It is not financial, tax or investment advice, and the ratios above are national statistical aggregates, not a valuation of any specific property or an indication of what any individual can borrow or afford. Confirm your own position with a licensed professional in the relevant country.

Primary sources: Numbeo, Property Prices Index by Country 2026 and the indicators methodology page (crowdsourced, updated continuously, published in annual and mid-year snapshots); Demographia International Housing Affordability, 2026 edition, Frontier Centre for Public Policy and Chapman University Center for Demographics and Policy, covering 95 major markets across eight nations on Q3 2025 data; Office for National Statistics (UK), Housing affordability in England and Wales: 2025, released 26 March 2026, using HM Land Registry Price Paid data and ASHE earnings; Cotality (formerly CoreLogic) Australian housing affordability reporting, 2025; OECD Housing Prices indicator, price-to-income index (an indexed measure, not a ratio); IMF Global Housing Watch and World Bank Data360 price-to-income indicators for cross-country context.

Figures as published; latest available as of August 2026. Methodologies differ as described above.