The English Housing Survey: experiences of the housing crisis survey from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government revealed how those in different housing tenures are affected by the shortage of affordable homes.
It found that, in 2023-24, private renters spent the highest proportion of their income on housing (34%), followed by social renters (26%) and mortgagors (19%).
Households who spent the highest proportion of their income on housing tended to be on lower incomes, have no dependent children, and be based in London or the South-East.
Private renters were the most likely to report difficulty affording their housing costs at 32%, followed by social renters at 28%, and mortgagors and shared owners were the least likely to report difficulty affording their housing costs (14%).
Thomas Lambert, financial planner at Quilter: “Private renters not only spend the highest proportion of their income on housing, coming in at just over a third (34%), but they are also the most likely to struggle to afford their housing costs (32%) and just half (52%) have savings behind them. Those having difficulty paying rent rose considerably from 27% in 2019-2020 to 32% in 2023-24, which followed the sharp rise in rent costs seen during the cost of living crisis and mortgage market turmoil.
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“Most commonly (32%), private renters had savings of between £5,000 and £15,999. This is unsurprising given the significant proportion of their income that goes on housing costs alone, but it is a clear representation of the struggle that many private renters who are keen to purchase their own home face.
“Comparatively, owner occupiers spend an average of 19% of their income on housing costs, 79% have savings, and 33% of them have savings of more than £50,000. Mortgagors were also the least likely to report difficulty affording their housing costs, at just 14%.”
Accessing property ownership
The survey found that overall number of first-time buyers increased from 617,000 households in 2013-14, to 827,000 in 2019-20 and 975,000 in 2023-24.
In 2023-24, the majority of first-time buyers were aged between 25-34 years old (60%) and 15% of first-time buyers bought a property in London.
First-time buyers were similar ages in 2023-24 compared with a decade ago, however, fewer first-time buyers are purchasing property in London now.
In 2023-24, under one million social renters and 2.6 million private renters expected to buy a home in the future.