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Germany's longstanding status as a nation of tenants shows no sign of changing — and new survey data suggests the gap between Germany and the rest of Europe is widening rather than closing.
According to the European Residential Property Trend Report published by estate agency network REMAX, which surveyed more than 21,000 people across 23 European countries, 31% of Germans have no interest whatsoever in owning their own home. That figure is more than double the European average of 15% and places Germany firmly at the bottom of the European table. At 63%, Germany's tenant rate is the highest on the continent, well ahead of Switzerland at 62% and Austria and Finland, which share third place at 48%. The European average proportion of tenants stands at just 29%.
Where ownership loses its appeal
The survey findings suggest that German reluctance to buy is driven as much by cultural preference as by financial constraint. Of those who expressed no interest in home ownership, 57% said they were satisfied with their current situation as tenants, 30% wished to avoid the obligations associated with owning property, and 18% cited the flexibility of renting as a decisive factor.
Loredana Scirè, press spokesperson for REMAX Germany, pointed to the structural deterrents embedded in the German system. "It is precisely the immense land transfer taxes in Germany that hinder flexible property changes for homeowners," she said, noting that high Grunderwerbsteuer rates effectively penalise owners who need to move for professional reasons — an advantage that renting retains.
Only 32% of German respondents said they live in a property they own or are currently paying off, a homeownership rate that contrasts sharply with Southern and Eastern Europe. Romania leads the European table at 83%, followed by Bulgaria and Croatia at 80% each, with Italy and Lithuania close behind at 79%.
Renting for life: a retirement reckoning
Beyond the immediate market implications, the data points to a longer-term structural concern. Scirè described the persistently low homeownership rate as "a warning sign," noting that owner-occupied property plays a central role in retirement planning by enabling rent-free living in old age and reducing monthly fixed costs significantly.
That warning is reinforced by separate research from the Association of Private Building Societies (VdPB), whose Savings Climate Index — conducted in August 2025 — found that saving for property had dropped from third to fourth place among savings priorities for the first time in recent years. Only 33% of respondents cited home ownership as a reason for saving, down from 43% a year earlier. Among 30- to 39-year-olds, 74% are now saving primarily for retirement, rising to 75% among 40- to 49-year-olds — a generational shift that suggests the aspiration of ownership is receding rather than merely being deferred.
The affordability data helps explain why. Buyers in Germany require an average of 10.2 years to save a sufficient deposit for their first property — the longest savings period in Europe and well above the continental average of 7.3 years. Finland, by comparison, requires just four years.
Research published by the German Economic Institute (IW) in collaboration with property portal Interhyp found that property prices have risen so sharply since 2015 that upper-middle-class families in metropolitan areas, coastal regions and the Alpine foothills face effective exclusion from the market without taking on a heavy financial burden.
Against that backdrop, Scirè was pointed in her assessment of government intervention. Support schemes designed to help prospective buyers have been "mostly symbolic gestures rather than effective tools," she said, arguing that reducing ancillary purchase costs and lowering required equity contributions would do more to shift the dial than existing programmes. "For many citizens, financing remains the biggest hurdle to purchasing an owner-occupied property," she added.
For institutional investors in German residential real estate, the data reinforces a structural dynamic that has long underpinned the investment case for rental housing in Germany's major cities. With ownership aspiration declining, deposit-saving timelines lengthening and government support widely regarded as inadequate, demand for professionally managed rental accommodation looks set to remain robust — even as affordability constraints tighten for would-be buyers across the income spectrum.