Your location: Six million depressed about housing
19 June 2008
A massive six million families are suffering stress or depression due to today’s sky-high housing costs.
A new report, Breaking Point, also highlights the desperate sacrifices people are making to keep a roof over their heads, including spending less on food, selling possessions, borrowing from friends and family, and depriving their children of treats.
The report, based on a YouGov survey of 6,799 adults in Great Britain, set out to discover what affect Britain's chronic shortage of affordable homes to buy and rent is having on ordinary people. And the findings are shocking.
- Six million (almost one in four) households are suffering stress or depression because of their housing costs
- Two million say meeting housing costs is a constant struggle, with 400,000 falling behind with rent or mortgage payments
- 6.3 million (one in four) are spending less on food
- Three million (one in nine) have sold possessions
- 2.8 million (11%) have been forced to borrow money to meet their housing costs in the last 12 months
- One million households (4.1%) pay more than two-thirds of their income on housing. Low-income households are far more likely to be paying a high proportion of their income on housing
- 4.1 million households (16%) have used a credit card to help meet their housing costs in the last 12 months
- Black and minority ethnic households, at 17%, are nearly twice as likely as white British households (9%) to say they are constantly struggling or falling behind with their housing payments.
Download Shelter's recommendations about what needs to be done in Scotland to address the affordability crisis.
