Young workers say they pay over 40 per cent of their salary on rent

The housing experiences of young people across the UK have recently been under scrutiny with students expressing discontent at many issues.

This dissatisfaction has been reported in a survey by TUC and Generation Rent, in which more than 2,300 young people responded to a request to share their housing experiences via a web questionnaire.

Young people are concerned as they face unaffordable housing costs, insecurity of tenure and exploitation by private landlords.

In terms of the demographics of the survey, half of the respondents were renting, a quarter had bought their own home and just under a quarter were living in someone else’s home.

Of those respondents renting and in work, the average rent-to-salary ratio (the proportion of a person’s pay taken up by their rent) is 41 per cent, which for single earner households is well above the 33 per cent household income threshold for affordable housing recommended by Shelter. Fifty-three per cent of renter respondents said that they paid more than the 33 per cent affordability threshold.

Regular rent increases also appear to be a problem with nearly a third of respondents who rent (31 per cent) saying had a rent increase in the last year.

These rent increases have contributed to an overall high cost of housing. Consequently, many respondents have been forced to live with their parents or in a relative or friend’s home. Those living in another person’s home are generally dissatisfied in doing so, with 44 per cent of people said they would like to rent but could not afford to.

Whereas renters are suffering, young buyers of houses can be optimistic with low interest rates are currently making mortgages cheaper than rents for many young people. This is shown by the average mortgage-to-salary payment ratio for home-owning respondents being 38 per cent, a slightly lower figure than the average rent-to-salary ratio found by the questionnaire.

However, more than half of the home-owning respondents (59 per cent) had needed financial help from family or friends to buy their home. Sixty-four per cent said that the prospect of interest rate rises worries them.

As well as the high cost of housing, respondents highlighted problems of housing tenure insecurity and landlord exploitation. Ten per cent of private renting respondents said they have been threatened with eviction, and 39 per cent said a landlord had refused to repay their deposit or made unreasonable deductions.

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “Many young people today are having a much tougher time than their parents ever did. Secure well-paid jobs are hard to find, and without help from family few can get a start on the home ownership ladder.

“The message from the many young workers who told us about their housing experiences is that it’s unaffordable and insecure. This is yet another indication that the assumption that each generation will be a bit better off than the last has now come to an end.”

Alex Hilton, Director of Generation Rent, said: “Each week, the average young worker hands over two days of their wages to their landlord, leaving them with very little money to spend or save. As the number of renters grows, politicians must end this ballooning exploitation or face the anger of a generation.”

Alex Hewetson, second year PPE student at Warwick, added on this issue through stating: “Housing is a huge issue. Personally I have had bad experiences with landlords: I was once put in a student house which had excessive damp in it. It was horrible, my lungs felt congested and the landlord did nothing about it. Worst of all I was using up most my student loan paying for the house. Only when the council got involved did anything improve”.