Housing Assets as a Potential Solution for Financial Hardship: Households’ Mental Accounts of Housing Wealth in Three European Countries

Abstract The global financial crisis means that households in all EU countries must deal with income and asset insecurity. Life cycle theories predict that households will consume their savings in times of financial hardship and in retirement. However, thus far, housing assets have been consumed far less than other assets, though it has been suggested that the increased availability of additional mortgage borrowing will potentially change this. In this paper, household considerations about building and consuming housing equity are explored in Germany, Hungary and the UK. Based on empirical qualitative data, this paper presents an analysis of the potential role of housing assets in these countries now and in the near future.