The Office for National Statistics (ONS) Impact of Increased Cost of Living Survey, conducted between September 2022 and January 2023 found that a quarter of respondents paying off a mortgage or loan which helped them buy a home said their mortgage costs had gone up.
Meanwhile, 23 per cent of renters saw a rise in rental costs and a third of shared ownership owners reported a rise in mortgage and rental costs.
Of those paying off a mortgage or loan, 59 per cent said it was very easy or somewhat easy to keep up with mortgage payments, as opposed to a quarter who were finding it very difficult or somewhat difficult.
Some 42 per cent of renters found it very or somewhat easy to keep up with rental costs, in contrast to 39 per cent who were struggling. Meanwhile, 51 per cent of shared ownership tenants said it was easy to keep up with costs compared to 31 per cent having trouble.
Impact of rising energy costs
Some 72 per cent of people paying off a mortgage or loan said their energy bills had gone up. A rise was also reported by 76 per cent of people who owned their homes outright, 78 per cent of renters, and 68 per cent of shared ownership tenants.
Some 64 per cent of people paying off a mortgage or home loan said they were cutting back on the use of gas or electricity in their homes, compared to 55 per cent of renters and 57 per cent of shared ownership tenants.
To try and mitigate rising energy costs, 30 per cent of people paying a mortgage or home loan said they were making energy efficient improvements to their properties. By comparison, 23 per cent of renters and 29 per cent of shared ownership tenants were doing the same.
Despite being more likely to cut back on the use of energy at home, 44 per cent of mortgage holders said they were finding it either very difficult or somewhat difficult to keep up with energy bills compared to 61 per cent of renters who said the same. Nearly half (47 per cent) of shared ownership tenants said it was very difficult or somewhat difficult to afford energy payments.
Maximising income
Around a quarter of all people in varying tenure types were making use of their savings to cope with the rising cost of living.
Renters were more likely to make use of credit than homeowners, with 22 per cent relying on this as a source of income compared to a fifth of shared ownership tenants and 18 per cent of people paying off a mortgage or home loan.
Almost three quarters of all respondents said the cost of living has increased in the last month.
A quarter of people paying off a mortgage or loan which helped them buy their home said they borrowed more money or used more credit in the last month than they did a year ago. Almost a quarter (24 per cent) of shared ownership tenants said the same, as did 31 per cent of renters.
Just 24 per cent of renters said they would be able to save money in the next 12 months, compared to 36 per cent of shared ownership tenants and 40 per cent of people paying off a mortgage or loan.
A similar share of people, 40 per cent, of those paying a mortgage or loan said they would not be able to put money away as savings. The inability to save over the next 12 months was true as cited by 56 per cent of renters and 42 per cent of shared ownership tenants.
Financial vulnerability
The ONS considers someone to be facing financial vulnerability if they experience three or more of the following conditions; being unable to afford a necessary but unexpected cost of £850, borrowing more money or credit compared to last year, being unable to save in the next 12 months or finding it difficult to afford energy bills.
The statistics showed that renters were 4.4 times more likely to be experiencing some form of financial vulnerability with 55 per cent saying they could not afford an unexpected but necessary cost of £850 compared to people who owned their homes outright.
Those paying off a mortgage or loan used to buy a home were found to be 2.3 times more likely to be facing a form of financial vulnerability.
