House prices forcing young couples to lodge with in-laws
02-09-2014
Almost 300,000 families living in another family’s home – many of them young couples living under the same roof as parents, census study shows
New analysis of returns from the 2011 census shows that the number of couples or single parents living under the same roof as another family leapt by 70 per cent Photo: ALAMY
By John Bingham, Social Affairs Editor
The number of young couples starting their lives together lodging with their parents or in-laws has soared in the last 10 years amid rising property prices and a squeeze on earnings, official figures suggest.
New analysis of returns from the 2011 census shows that the number of couples or single parents living under the same roof as another family leapt by 70 per cent in a decade.
Overall there are estimated to be 289,000 families living in another family home in England and Wales – most of them under the age of 35, the Office for National Statistics said.
The figure does not include millions of young adults still living with their parents or who have moved back in after university, the so-called “boomerang generation”.
Nor does it include single, elderly parents living with their children’s families, often in “granny flat” arrangements.
The phenomenon is highlighted in a study by ONS statisticians identifying so-called “concealed families” – those living as family units but who would not show up on statistics as a household in their own right because they live under the same roof as another family.
Although they represent just under two per cent of all families, the ONS said they were a vital indicator of housing demand in Britain.
Last year a study by the insurance giant Aviva concluded that as many as 36 million people in Britain now have experience of living as adults in the same home as another generation of their family including almost three million for whom the arrangement lasted as long as 10 years.
The ONS said so-called concealed families could include young adults living with a spouse or partner or children in the same household as their parents as well as adult families sharing a home.
While for some the main motivation is financial, there could also be cultural reasons in some communities, the ONS said.
Overall, almost two thirds of them are couples, including 41,000 with children of their own.
There are also 84,000 single parents with children, living with other families, often the children’s grandparents.
The practice is most common in London, which has by far the highest property prices in Britain and accounts for 69,000 concealed families. There are another 39,000 across the rest of the South East of England.
In Newham, east London, alone there were 5,000 families living under another family’s roof - around 7.5 per cent of all families in the borough.
The census showed similar levels in Brent, north west London, Slough, Berks and Ealing, west London among other areas.
“Family concealment proportions are likely to relate to a number of factors including: housing availability and cost in relation to employment and earnings, and cultural differences in living arrangements and familial ties,” the ONS said.
In just over half of cases the ONS’s “reference person” for the family – often whoever filled in the census form - is under the age of 35.
“This suggests that concealed families were more likely to be younger parents or couples living with their parents in multi-generational households," it aid.
“The younger age of concealed family reference person may also relate to the age profile of some ethnic groups.”