A study of several major developed economies between 1960 and 1996, by the British economist Andrew Oswald, found a strong relationship between increases in homeownership and increases in the unemployment rate; a ten-per-cent increase in homeownership correlated with a two-per-cent increase in unemployment. (In the U.S., it may be worth noting, the states that have the highest unemployment rates–states like Alabama, Michigan, Mississippi–are also among those with the highest homeownership rates.)
(For those of you who weren’t reading the blog in September, I had a series of posts on the downside of homeownership here, here, and here.)
Your links to your own blog entries on the drawbacks of home ownership are broken.