"Nonetheless, there is cross-cultural evidence that people who own their own houses are in better health than people who rent their houses, even controlling for income..."
-http://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2458-11-682
" Generation rent is suffering, and there’s no end in sight"
-the guardian
"Housing is one of the most basic needs for families, and yet for many Australians it is increasingly at risk. The impact of higher housing costs is most strongly felt by lower-income groups, particularly low-income renters for whom home ownership is increasingly out of reach (Yates & Milligan, 2007).
This paper explores the relationship between housing affordability, housing stress, and mental health and wellbeing. The first section examines some recent statistics on housing affordability in Australia and defines some key terms. Some of the potential impacts of housing issues on health and wellbeing, and how this influences outcomes for Australian families are examined. The relevance of these issues to family and relationship service provision is explored, and ideas for service responses are provided."
- Australian govt website
This is something I have recently been thinking about. As a renter, I wonder how renting a house vs owning it impacts our psyche and mental health/physical health, even allowing for all other variables etc. Renting is a never ending cost. The money comes out of your account every week. It's not paying off towards a goal, like a mortgage. Effectively, it's just income flushed down the toilet to somewhere it will never touch your bank account again. And the cost will never go away, or decrease, unlike a mortgage or similar goal payment towards something.
These were some adjectives I associated with renting a house that someone else owns. The adjectives I came up with were - transient, temporary, inferior, vulnerable.
PLAN
It was once an attainable goal for people to work towards owning their own home, but no more is this realistic for a lot of people. The renting population almost outnumbers those that own homes now, and this is set to keep increasing and have - gasp - lifelong renters, with no end in sight!!
With this demographic set to grow, how can we mitigate/explore/help the negative psychological effect of renting on tenants?
"Le Grand has argued that housing is no different from any other good in a capitalist society and should be considered fundamentally in monetary terms [32]. The contrary view is that the ontological security provided by housing is high on the hierarchy of needs and confers a unique range of services."
graph
"Tenure appears to be a better predictor of mental health than economic wellbeing. Levels of anxiety and depression are high across social groups – 28% for ABs, 29% for C1s and 31% for DEs."
Renters live a precarious existence where they have no idea if they’ll be living in their home in a year’s time, or if they’ll be able to afford to. They might also live in squalid conditions that they are powerless to do anything about. That lack of stability and comfort erodes their wellbeing so it is no surprise that levels of anxiety and depression are higher than for home owners. Better rights for renters would not only create a fairer housing market, but there’d be public health benefits too."
Shaw, 2004.
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