So that's not the driving factor.
The bubble is:
(that's debt to net disposable income, in various countries: US, UK, Japan on the left, Germany, France, Italy Spain on the right. Note the different scales) In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
According to the St Louis Fed, America is at about 69%. (The figures on younger buyers -- under 35 years old -- from '95 to '04 are interesting.) Ireland, according to the same report, comes in at a whopping 80%.
I'd be interested to know how these figures stack up against household debt. Britain is dealing with much higher price-to-income ratios on housing than America, -- a bit under six vs a bit under four -- so, knowing that home ownership rates are roughly the same, the UK should be enduring higher household debt. That chart seems to support it. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
As a result it's hard to find good rental properties, and most come fully furnished because there is/was a clause that reduced a tenants rights if the flat was furnished.
