Widespread ownership of the family home is surely quite a modern aspiration, and not something on which there is a huge amount of history. Seems a funny situation when the government is (on the one hand) doing everything possible to fight general price inflation while (on the other) trying to convince people that there's no real cause for panic because the value of their homes is starting to stagnate. House price rises seem to be a strange anomaly - inflation which is welcomed and even encourage by large swathes of the population.

The anglo-saxon preoccupation with owning the roof over one's head is mystifying to some of our continental friends - but with their relative security of tenure and a generally benevolent regime around rental tenants, this is hardly surprising. Quietly the government seems to have been improving the lot of rental tenants over the last few years (deposits going to escrow is a part of this) and while there's still a long way to go, we might be starting to see the start of a shift away from a blind worship of property ownership.

Anyway, going back to the start of the thread - that much money for one of those tiny poky characterless flats is obscene, IMHO.