More than every tenth household in Germany (10.7 percent) has to spend more than 40 percent of its income on housing and is therefore considered overburdened.
In tenant households, this proportion was 12.8 percent in 2021, as the Federal Statistical Office in Wiesbaden announced on Friday.
People in the lowest income bracket and in cities are particularly affected.
Monthly housing expenses make up a large part of the cost of living;
As a rule, expenses for living and especially rents are monthly fixed costs with little or no potential for savings, the statisticians explained.
On average, households in Germany had to spend 23.3 percent of their disposable income on housing costs last year.
Anyone who lives alone for rent has to spend more than a third (35.4 percent) of their income on housing costs on average.
Every fourth tenant living alone paid more than 40 percent in 2021 and was therefore considered overburdened.
According to statistics, single-parent tenants also have an above-average housing cost burden - the proportion was almost 31 percent last year.
According to the statistics, housing costs are a particularly heavy burden on the bottom fifth of all tenant households in terms of income - they spent an average of 42.6 percent of their income on housing in 2021.
According to the information, the housing cost burden is higher in cities at 26.8 percent of income than in rural areas at 24.9 percent.
According to the statistics, the increase in net rents has so far been “moderate” compared to the price increases for energy and food, for example.
From July 2021 to July 2022, rents increased by 1.7 percent - consumer prices as a whole increased by 7.5 percent during this period.
In the period from 2015 to 2021, however, net rents rose by 8.5 percent.
In Germany, a lot of people live in rented accommodation in an EU comparison - in 2021 the proportion in this country was 50.5 percent.