Proportion of households in London that are overcrowded by tenure (2011/12 - 2021/22)
This indicator was last updated in March 2024. It is now archived and will no longer be updated. Explore London’s Poverty Profile to view our up to date indicators. If you have any questions, get in touch.
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The extent to which housing in London meets household needs can be measured in a range of ways. One of those is overcrowding. Here this is defined using the “bedroom standard”. For example, a home is considered overcrowded if two or more people of a different sex (who are not a couple) over the age of 10 need to sleep in the same room.
On this measure, 7.9% of households in London are overcrowded.
Social rented housing has the highest proportion of households in overcrowded conditions, with 16.4% overcrowded. This contrasts with just 1.9% of owner-occupied households. 11.8% of private rented households are overcrowded.
Although there is variation by tenure type, overcrowding overall has remained the roughly same in London over the last 10 years, with 7.9% of households overcrowded in 2020/21 compared to 8.3% in 2011/12. Social rented households have seen an increase in overcrowding in that same period.