Young renters feel they are lonely outsiders

Lack of opportunities to buy a home has created a generation with little sense of belonging or trust

BEING unable to get on to the housing ladder is creating a generation of lonely young people who do not feel part of their communities, an Office for National Statistics report has found.

It identified “younger renters with little trust and sense of belonging to their area” as a group with a high risk of loneliness.

Only one in four of this group, aged between 16 and 34, said they could trust their neighbours, while 55 per cent said they belonged in their neighbourhood “not very strongly” or “not at all”. Of the people in this group, 61 per cent said they felt lonely occasionally, or more often. Almost one in 10 renters reported feeling lonely often or always, compared with less than 4 per cent of homeowners.

Dan Wilson-craw, of Generation Rent, which campaigns on behalf of renters, said: “This is what we’d expect from a rented sector where renters are moving frequently. A given renter is more likely to be newer to the area than a homeowner, so they won’t have those local connections or relationships with other people in the local area.

“That reflects both the flexibility of the rented sector and the lack of security, which creates this churn, because of rents going up and landlords taking back their property, or ending a tenancy early.

“People are likely to be caught up in that and finding themselves in a new home and a new neighbourhood with people, often sharing with people they don’t know very well. That all adds up to it being quite isolating.” He said plans to explore incentives for longer tenancies, which were announced by Philip Hammond, the Chancellor, in last year’s autumn Budget, could help fix the problem.

Charities and campaigners last night called for the return of youth clubs to help millennials fight loneliness. Denise Hatton, the chief executive of YMCA England and Wales, the youth charity, said councils were spending less on youth services, so young people were losing out on opportunities to make new friends and socialise.

Figures published this year by the Institute of Fiscal Studies, a think tank, found that just one in four of those born in the late Eighties owned their own home at 27, compared with one in three born in the early Eighties and 43 per cent of those born a decade earlier.

Women felt lonely more often than men, with just over half saying they felt lonely occasionally or more often, compared with 40 per cent of men. Being single or widowed was also a risk factor, with the least lonely group named as married homeowners, in good health, who were living with others.

Experts called for more support to help people form stable relationships. Chris Sherwood, the chief executive of Relate, the counselling charity, said: “Although being in a relationship is not a guarantee against loneliness, the statistics indicate that people living alone are at greater risk.”

The figures suggested that financial insecurity and poor health are major drivers of loneliness, with another high-risk group identified as unmarried, middle-aged people with longterm health conditions, who were more likely than average to be renting, disabled and unemployed.

Also at risk were widowed people aged over 65, who were likely to be homeowners, living alone and coping with a long-term health condition.