How many years do you have to work to buy a house in Milan? How many in Rome, Florence or Bolzano? A survey carried out from 11 to 18 April 2023 by Ener2Crowd.com, an Italian environmental and energy lending crowdfunding platform and APP, investigated the average time needed to purchase a property, considering new parameters that show a worse situation than expected. Let's find out in which city you need to work for more years to buy a house.
Buying a house with a precarious contract, young people are at a disadvantage
The research, based on Istat data, analysed in detail the situation in 107 cities by calculating the savings capacity, average real estate prices in March 2023 and the average time needed to purchase a property of 100 square metres. The result is that, whereas until the 1970s, even a factory worker with an average salary of 50,000 lire per month could afford to buy a flat in a central area in about 20 years, today they would not even be able to do so in 40 years. The scenario examined by Ener2Crowd.com therefore sees younger people, with more precarious contracts, increasingly distant from the possibility of buying a flat and when they manage to do so, they are forced into lifelong debt.
How many years' salary to buy a house
Analysing the number of years of salary needed to buy a house in the various Italian cities, in Milan it takes as many as 50.3 years and even more in Lucca (51.3 years), Savona (55.6 years) and Bolzano (63.1 years).
These very long periods are due to the current labour market and low and inconstant wages, also in Florence (49.3 years), in Sassari (49.1 years), in Imperia (48.3 years), in Grosseto (46.6 years), in Rimini (44.5 years), in Rome and in Aosta (43.7 years in both cities). Times are relatively long even in cities where property prices are much more affordable, such as Biella (€60,900) or Caltanissetta (€69,200), where it takes 9.6 and 12.4 years respectively.
Regions where it takes the longest to buy a house
In terms of regional averages, it takes 50 years’ salary to buy a house in Trentino-Alto Adige, which is in the ballpark with Valle d'Aosta (43.7 years) and Tuscany (40.7 years). Also in the top-5 are Liguria and Lazio where it takes 40.4 and 39.7 years’ salary respectively to buy a house, while Lombardy is sixth with 33.6 years, after Sardinia (39.4 years).