ABSTRACT
Owner occupation became a major housing tenure in the years between the First and Second WorId Wars. Prior to 1914 less than 10 per cent of households owned their houses; by 1938 the number had risen to almost a third. The main impetus to this growth was a housebuilding boom of unprecedented dimensions. Millions ofhouses were built at prices large sections of the population could afford, even though mortgage finance was expensive because mortgage interest rates were high compared to other contemporary interest rates and the relative burden of paying off mortgage debt was rising owing to the general fall in prices over most of the period. During these years many existing houses were also sold for owner occupation: 1.1 million of them in fact, 14 per cent of the 1914 housing stock (according to the 1977 Housing Policy Review). But these second-hand houses were sold at prices and under conditions primarily set by the new housing market, so it is on that sector that attention must be concentrated.
