The millennial housing crisis: Number of young adults living with their parents soars 26% in 20 years
- London saw the biggest increase in millennials living at home
- The North East and Yorkshiren where houses are cheaper saw the lowest rise
- Young adults are less likely to live on their own than they were two decades ago
The number of young adults living with their parents has soared by more than a quarter in two decades ago in the face of skyrocketing rents and house prices, new research reveals.
The number of 20 to 34-year-olds living with their parents in the UK increased from 2.7million to 3.4million between 1998 and 2017, a rise of 26 per cent, according to think-tank Civitas.
This means that 26 per cent of all adults in that age group were living in their childhood home in 2017 compared to 20 per cent in 1998.
Over a quarter of young adults are still living at home, 900,000 more than in the 1990s
The growth in young adults living with their parents has been highest in London, which saw a 41 per cent increase between 1998 and 2015.
The difference was smallest in the North-East, which saw a 17 per cent rise, and Yorkshire and the Humber, which saw a 14 per cent rise.
Daniel Bentley, editorial director at Civitas, said: ‘An important consequence of the housing crisis that has gone largely unnoticed has been depressed household formation.
‘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.
‘And those who have moved out have been much more inclined than in the 1990s to share, either with a partner or others.’
The report also found that average household sizes, which had been falling for most of the 20th century, plateaued in the 2000s and have even started rising in some places.
Young adults are now much less likely to live on their own than they were two decades ago after a collapse in single living among younger age groups, which had been an increasingly popular choice until the late 1990s.
Among 25 to 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.
Most of this change occurred among those aged between 22 and 29. The steepest increase by age was among 23-year-olds: those living with their parents rose from 37 per cent to 49 per cent between 2003 and 2017.
The Local Government Association’s housing spokesman, Councillor Martin Tett, said: ‘These figures show that our national housing shortage remains one of the most pressing issues we face, especially for young people, who are increasingly unable to afford their own place.
‘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.’