There are a number of problems with this particular statistic.
The first one is probably the assumption that nearly everyone SHOULD be a homeowner - as if by some natural right (otherwise why determine the number in the first place).
The second problem is in how the number is composed - it may be close to the actual number but the data it draws on is not precise to begin with.
A third problem is how everyone imagines this number - as if the 65% is the same static group of people every time it’s reported. It’s not. Besides those who can simply “not afford to buy a home”, there are people who by age and life circumstances - the young just entering the workforce and the elderly at “the last years of life” - are adults for whom life circumstances alone either keep them or take them out of the ranks of “homeowners”.
For the younger adults it is only natural in this post-housing-boom-to-bust economic cycle that reaching “home ownership” has and will be “delayed” longer than when the economy is growing well. Jobs, not “housing” is what they need. Jobs has to come first. When it does, “housing” will follow.
And, the demographic aging of the population does not stop just because (and whether or not) the economy is not doing well. The numbers of moves from “home owner” to living with their kids, or to an “assisted living” venue, or to a nursing home will likely grow during the decades the bulge of baby boomers continues to age (and “depressing” the number of “home owners”).
And lastly, maybe “full home ownership”, like full employment, is an unrealistic idea and goal to begin with.
Everyone who has owned a home knows that at the end of the day (when the mortgage is paid off), they may have ownership of some equity value in their home, that they would not have had as a renter, but getting there - mortgage, utilities, property taxes, insurance, maintenance, improvements - was not less cost - during the process - than the rent and utilities cost for many renters.
Just maybe, not being a home owner is just as justified, economically, for some people (at some time or even always) as home owning is for other people.
How about we let organic economics work and take the “home ownership” statistic for what it is - an interesting number, with many underlying causes but possibly not something to be overly alarmed about. It is a result. It is not by itself a cause. Repair the cause (primarily jobs) and housing will follow to the extent it can. But don’t expect EVERYONE must become a homeowner; as something that MUST reflect what everyone’s economic situation SHOULD provide. That is most likely neither realistic or needed.
Excellent post!