Optometrists to Dancers: Which Americans Are Most Likely to Own Homes?

REAL ESTATE TOPICS

• By
 
• NEIL SHAH
• 
  

Who’s more likely to own a home — those in jobs that pay more, right? A new study by Ancestry.com Inc. suggests the answer is more complex.

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Roughly 90% of optometrists in the U.S. owned a home in 2012, according to the family-tree website, which analyzed census data going back to 1900. So did 87% of dentists and 81% of pharmacists. By contrast, only 46% of roofers owned homes, and only 27% of waiters and waitresses. Dance instructors? Just 23%.

Presumably this is because pharmacists typically make more than dancers. Yet Ancestry.com found that some jobs that weren’t especially high-paying had higher homeownership rates than occupations with bigger paychecks.

Firefighters, for example, rank very highly; 84% own homes. Some 78% of mail carriers own homes—the same as for lawyers and judges. Teachers (74%) ranked higher than economists (64%).

It’s hard to draw too many conclusions from these figures—especially about how they’ve changed over time.

The data stretch back 112 years, but an electrician today isn’t the same as one in 1950 (73% of electricians own homes, by the way, the same as for stock and bond salesmen).

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There are plenty of head-scratchers: While few dancers own, 62% of musicians and music teachers do, along with 63% of artists and art teachers. On the flipside, just 33% of people in the armed forces own, making them one of the lowest-ranking groups. (In case you’re curious, the figure for editors and reporters is 62%.)

Still, the study clearly suggests that factors other than pay go into whether you buy a home—one might be job and financial security. It’s probably not an accident that government jobs tend to have high rates of homeownership.

At the same time, if you’re not paid a lot, it’s probably pretty certain you won’t be buying a home, the study shows.

Here’s a chart you can play with to see how your own profession stacks up in terms of the likelihood of buying a home. (If the categories feel old-fashioned, it’s because they are: Researchers started with Census classifications from 1950, then standardized occupations back to 1900 and forward to 2012. Thus “charwoman” alongside “cleaners.”)