It is very important for Hungarians to own their homes

The majority of people in Hungary want to own their own home and are prepared to make sacrifices to do so, according to an economist of the think tank Századvég Gazdaságkutató.

The government’s home-creation support scheme forms a part of wider measures to help young families with children afford their own homes, István Lóránd Szakáli said in an interview to the daily Magyar Nemzet.

The scheme launched in July 2015 has had big impact on new housing construction, he said in the interview published on Saturday.

In 2015, 7,612 new housing units were built, while in 2020 this numbered 28,208, giving a boost to the construction, real estate and credit markets, he noted.

He said that if the scheme were suspended or even scrapped, there’d be serious economic and even psychological effects.