Global housing market shift toward rentership

Economic and structural factors are driving a global trend toward renting rather than homeownership. High interest rates increase mortgage costs, forcing potential buyers to remain in the rental market, while inflation often leads to higher rents as landlords pass on operational costs.

In the United States, data from RentCafe indicates a significant shift among high-income households. Between 2016 and 2024, the number of millionaire renter households increased by 229%, a growth rate that has outpaced the 193% growth in millionaire homeownership. This trend is most prominent in major metropolitan areas like New York City, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, but is also expanding into mid-sized cities such as Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and Provo, Utah. Additionally, Southern metropolitan areas are seeing rapid growth as corporations like Tesla and Oracle relocate to the region.

Wealthy individuals are increasingly opting to rent to maintain liquidity in a strong stock market and to avoid the high costs and long timelines of luxury real estate transactions. Beyond cyclical economic shifts, long-term demographic changes and the rising cost of property ownership are creating structural demand across various sectors, including student housing, senior housing, and build-to-rent communities.

In France, the long-term furnished rental market has doubled in size over the last 20 years, reaching approximately one million properties. An investigation by the National Housing Information Agency (Anil) shows that furnished rentals command higher prices than unfurnished ones, with average rent differentials of 10%, rising to 15% in high-demand areas like the Paris region.