ONE million more young aduflts are living with their parents than two decades ago, an alarming study into the housing crisis has found.
One in four 20-34 year-olds now live at home - a total of 3.4 million and a third higher than the late 1990s, according to analysis by the Civitas think tank.
And when youngsters do finally move out they’re much less likely to live alone as many of those moving out share the costs of running a home with friends or a partner.
There are 1.3 million 20-34 year-olds living solo now compared to a high of 1.8 million in 2002.
The report blames the growing trend in youngsters living with parents on soaring rents, household bills and the decline in social housing.
This “collapse in single living” partly explains why average household sizes - which had been falling for most of the 20th century - plateaued in the 2000s and have even started rising in some places.
A previous report from Lloyds Bank found the average house across UK cities in 2018 equated to 7.2 times average annual earnings, making the cost of buying a home the least affordable since 2007.
The proportion of “single-person” households has plateaued at about 30 per cent, in contrast to some other parts of Europe where single living has been increasing - to more than 35 per cent of all households in France and the Netherlands and more than 40 per cent in Germany and Denmark.
Civitas boss Daniel Bentley said: “An important consequence of the housing crisis that has gone largely unnoticed has been depressed household formation.
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“As owner-occupation and social housing have each become more difficult to enter, hundreds of thousands of young adults have taken one look at the high rents in the private rented sector and decided to stay with their parents a bit longer instead.
“And those who have moved out have been much more inclined than in the 1990s to share, either with a partner or others.”
He added: “Building new homes in line with household growth during this period would entrench the under-supply of housing for decades to come.”
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