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Five key lessons from the housing data in Census 2021
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has published its housing census data, which includes a breakdown of tenure, occupancy and energy costs. Grainne Cuffe and Stephen Delahunty look at five key takeaways
The non-ministerial department collects this information once a decade and crunches the numbers to provide a statistical overview of the make-up and quality of housing across England and Wales.
The last time this information was collected was in 2011, so the comparable stats show changes over the decade up to 2021, broken down into a number of datasets including tenure, region, occupancy and heating.
The figures show that the proportion of people in social housing is falling and nearly half of adults are struggling to pay their energy bills. Meanwhile, London is both the least affordable region and has the highest levels of overcrowding.
Inside Housing highlights the key takeaways from the data.
Proportion of social housing tenants falls
The past 10 years have seen a drop in the number of social housing renters and a spike in private renters.
Since the Right to Buy was launched by Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s, 1.9 million homes have been sold to tenants through the scheme.
In June, then-prime minister Boris Johnson said in a speech, prior to his resignation, that the government will extend the Right to Buy to housing association tenants, following a pilot scheme launched in 2018.
The idea was first proposed by David Cameron in 2015 and was widely criticised in the sector, with some warning it will reduce the supply of social homes further.
The latest data shows that the proportion of households renting in the social sector decreased from 17.6% (4.1 million) in 2011 to 17.1% (4.2 million) in 2021. Privately renting households made up 20.3% of the population, up from 16.7% in 2011.
There was a decrease in the proportion of households that owned their own homes from 64.3% (15 million) in 2011 to 62.5% (15.5 million). The data shows a 3% increase in the proportion of households renting to 37.3%, up from 34.3% in 2011.
Of those, 32.8% of households owned their home outright, an increase of 2% compared with 2011. Those that either owned their home with a mortgage, loan, or shared ownership made up 29.7% of homeowners – a drop of nearly 4% compared with 2011.
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More than one million people living in overcrowded homes
Overcrowding is a significant issue in social housing, particularly where there are nowhere near enough homes to meet demand. A study in 2021 found that overcrowded housing in England may have contributed to increased deaths during the coronavirus pandemic.
The latest census figures show a small decrease in the number of overcrowded homes across England and Wales since 2011. In 2021, 1.1 million households, or 4.3% of the population, lived in overcrowded homes, with fewer bedrooms than required.
Some 26.5% of households had the number of bedrooms they needed and the remaining 69.2% had more bedrooms than required.
In Wales, the proportion of overcrowded households was 2.2% compared with 4.4% in England. In both nations, the proportion of households living in overcrowded homes has decreased since 2011, when it was 2.9% in Wales and 4.6% in England.
However, overcrowding was much higher in London. More than one in 10 or 380,000 households in the capital were overcrowded – the highest proportion in England.
Newham was the worst London borough, with more than a fifth – 25,000 – of households living in overcrowded conditions. This was followed by Barking and Dagenham with 17.8%.
Almost half are struggling to pay energy bills
Hot on the heels of a report published by the Environmental Audit Committee earlier this week, the census data looks at how homes are being heated across England and Wales.
MPs told the government that it should target the delivery of one million energy-efficiency improvements to homes a year in England by 2025 and adopt a “war effort” push on energy efficiency.
The census data shows why the issue requires a war-like footing. More than half (56%) of adults said they were reducing their energy use because of rising costs and almost half (47%) said they were finding it very or somewhat difficult to pay energy bills.
In September, the government announced plans to freeze energy bills at an average of £2,500 a year for the next two years from 1 October under an “energy price guarantee” as a result of rising energy costs.
But a price cap is irrelevant if a household does not have central heating.
While the vast majority of households across England and Wales reported that they had central heating in 2021 (98.5%, 24.4 million), a total of 1.5% (367,000) of households had no central heating.
The most common responses were mains gas (73.8%, 18.3 million), two or more types of central heating (not including renewable energy; 8.5%, 2.1 million) and electric (8.5%, 2.1 million).
England had a higher proportion of households with no central heating (1.5%, 352,000) compared with Wales (1.2%, 15,000).
For the first time, the 2021 Census records whether a household’s central heating used renewable energy sources. Overall, 0.9% of households in England and Wales (233,000) used at least one renewable energy source.
In addition, the proportion of households using at least one renewable energy source was slightly higher in Wales (1.1%, 14,000) than in England (0.9%, 219,000).
Private rented sector doubles in two decades
As the private rented sector has grown substantially since 2001, London has become the least affordable region to live in.
The ONS data estimates that the number of privately rented dwellings has doubled in England since 2001 to 4.9 million, or 20% of all dwellings, in 2021. A similar pattern has occurred in Wales, where an estimated 14% of dwellings were privately rented in 2020. In Northern Ireland, 14% of households were privately rented in 2020.
The ONS considers a property ‘affordable’ if a household would spend the equivalent of 30% or less of their income on rent. The data in this section is for financial years, so 2021 refers to 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021.
Private renters on a median household income could expect to spend 26% of their income on a median-priced rented home in England, compared with 23% in both Wales and Northern Ireland, in the financial year ending March 2021.
London was the least affordable region, with a median rent of £1,430 being equivalent to 40% of median income.
London Councils made a stark warning in August about a spike in homelessness across the capital as skyrocketing inflation and energy bills look set to worsen the cost of living crisis.
An analysis by the cross-party group estimated that 125,000 low-income households in the capital were at heightened risk of homelessness because their benefit entitlement now falls short of meeting their rent.
Elsewhere, the ONS found that the West Midlands and East Midlands were the most affordable regions with median rents being equivalent to 21% and 22%, respectively, of median income.
Despite having very different levels of median income and rents, Yorkshire and the Humber and the South East had similar ratios of private rental affordability (31%).
The West Midlands is the only English region where a lower quartile rent is equivalent to less than 30% of a lower quartile household income.
London has lowest level of homeownership
Alongside being the least affordable region, the capital also had the lowest overall homeownership (46.8%) of any English region.
More than half of households in London rent, either privately (30%) or in the social rented sector (23.1%). Within the capital, Hackney had the highest proportion of households renting in social housing at 40.5%, followed by Islington at 40.2%.
In the Midlands, 23.5% of Birmingham and 26.6% of Sandwell households were social renters in 2021. In Nottingham, 25.5% rented in the social sector, compared with 26.4% in Liverpool and 27.3% in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Overall, homeownership was higher in Wales at 66.4% than in England at 62.3%.
