Quarter of young adults still living with parents

One in four young adults are still living with their parents, according to a new survey.

The survey by the cross-party think tank Civitas has revealed the number of 20-to-34-year-olds in the UK living in the parental home has soared by almost 1 million in the last two decades.

According to the survey, 2.4 million (19.48% of that age group) lived with their parents in 1998, compared with 3.4 million (25.91%) in 2017.

And among 25-44 year-olds, the number of people living alone in the UK has fallen from a high of 1.8 million in 2002 to 1.3 million in 2017.

The growth in young adults living with their parents has been highest in London (a 41% increase between 1996-8 and 2014-15) where housing costs are greatest, and smallest in the North-East (17 %) and Yorkshire and the Humber (14%) where average housing costs are lowest.

‘As owner-occupation and social housing have each become more difficult to enter, hundreds of thousands of young adults have taken one look at the high rents in the private rented sector and decided to stay with their parents a bit longer instead,’ said Civitas editorial director, Daniel Bentley.

‘And those who have moved out have been much more inclined than in the 1990s to share, either with a partner or others.

‘It is essential that in forecasting future housing needs the government does not use household formation patterns during this period as a guide because they reflect to a significant extent the outcomes of a dysfunctional housing market.

‘Building new homes in line with household growth during this period would entrench the under-supply of housing for decades to come,’ he added.

The Local Government Association’s housing spokesman, Cllr Martin Tett, said the survey figures highlight the impact the national housing shortage is having on young people, who are ‘increasingly unable to afford their own place’.

‘Councils want to ensure that a mix of homes to rent and buy are affordable and available for those people that need them,’ said Cllr Tett.

‘By recently lifting the housing borrowing cap, the Government has accepted our call for councils to play a leading role in solving our housing crisis.

‘A genuine renaissance in council housebuilding would not only boost housing supply, but increase affordability and the number of people able to get on the housing ladder. For that to happen, councils also need to be able to set Right to Buy discounts locally and keep 100 per cent of their sales receipts to replace every home sold.’