Press release No. 428 of 29 October 2020
WIESBADEN – In 2019, 11.4 million people in Germany were living in households faced with excessive housing costs. They represented about 14% of the total population. A household is overburdened by housing costs if more than 40% of its disposable income is spent on housing, regardless of whether the dwelling is rented or owner-occupied. The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) also reports that, according to current results of the EU-SILC (LEBEN IN EUROPA) survey, the housing cost overburden rate has slightly decreased since 2014. Back then, roughly 16% of the population (12.7 million) were overburdened by housing costs.