People without decent homes

Published

1. Main facts and figures

  • in the 2 years to March 2019, an average of 17% of households in England lived in a home with no modern facilities, no effective insulation or heating, or in a state of disrepair (a ‘non-decent home’)
  • 18% of White British households lived in a non-decent home
  • households from the Mixed White and Asian (4%), Chinese (5%) and Indian (11%) ethnic groups were less likely to live in a non-decent home than White British households

2. Things you need to know

What the data measures

The data measures the percentage of households in England living in a ‘non-decent’ home, by ethnicity.

A home is non-decent if any of the following apply:

  • it does not meet the basic legal health and safety standards for housing
  • it is not in a reasonable state of repair
  • it does not have reasonably modern facilities and services
  • it has insulation or heating that is not effective

Read more about the definition of a decent home.

The information relates to households of either one person or a group of people sharing cooking facilities and a living room or dining area. It must be their main or only home.

Percentages are rounded to the nearest whole number but have been worked out using unrounded numbers.

Not included in the data

Estimates based on fewer than 30 households have not been included. This is because it is harder to make reliable generalisations from smaller numbers of survey respondents.

The ethnic groups used in the data

For data analysed by ethnicity, the 18 ethnic groups from the 2011 Census are shown.

Each household’s ethnic group is the ethnicity of the ‘household reference person’ (usually the person responsible for paying the rent or mortgage). There may be people of different ethnicities in the same household.

The ethnicity was known for 99.8% of households.

Methodology

Read the detailed methodology document for this data.

The data is an average for the 2 years from April 2017 to March 2019. This is to make sure there are enough households to be able to make reliable generalisations. You can read more about combining multiple years of data and some of the issues involved.

The figures on this page are based on survey data. Find out more about:

In the data file

See Download the data for:

  • figures rounded to 1 decimal place
  • sample sizes
  • weighted figures for the numerator and denominator

3. By ethnicity

Percentage and number of households (in thousands) living in non-decent homes by ethnicity
Ethnicity % Number of non-decent homes All households
All 17 4,037 23,400
Asian
Bangladeshi 24 27 112
Chinese 5 7 135
Indian 11 58 514
Pakistani 17 58 342
Asian other 18 37 206
Black
Black African 16 72 448
Black Caribbean 20 60 302
Black other 10 2 24
Mixed
Mixed White/Asian 4 2 63
Mixed White/Black African 33 15 46
Mixed White/Black Caribbean 15 11 74
Mixed other 11 10 93
White
White British 18 3,402 19,313
White Irish 18 40 215
White Gypsy/Traveller withheld because a small sample size makes it unreliable withheld because a small sample size makes it unreliable withheld because a small sample size makes it unreliable
White other 16 190 1,220
Other
Arab 11 6 59
Any other 17 40 230

Download table data for ‘By ethnicity’ (CSV) Source data for ‘By ethnicity’ (CSV)

Summary of People without decent homes By ethnicity Summary

The data shows that:

  • in the 2 years to March 2019, an average of 18% of White British households lived in a non-decent home
  • households from the Mixed White and Asian (4%), Chinese (5%) and Indian (11%) ethnic groups were less likely to live in a non-decent home than White British households
  • Mixed White and Black African households (33%) were more likely to live in a non-decent home than White British households

4. Data sources

Source

Type of data

Survey data

Type of statistic

National Statistics

Publisher

Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities

Note on corrections or updates

Information published in the EHS headline report and other annual reports is usually based on a 12-month period, rather than the 2 years’ combined data used here. As a result, the statistics shown here may not match those in the EHS reports.

Publication frequency

Yearly

Purpose of data source

The English Housing Survey is a continuous national survey commissioned by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. It collects information about people’s housing circumstances and the condition and energy efficiency of housing in England.

5. Download the data

People without decent homes - Spreadsheet (csv) 4 KB

This file contains the following variables: Measure, Time, Time_type, Ethnicity, Ethnicity_type, Geography, Age_group, NS-SEC, Income_band, Region, Value, Numerator, Denominator, Sample_size