Only one in three Basque youth becomes independent before age 35
- Only 32.9% of children under 35 years of age were emancipated in 2021 in the CAPV. In other words, two out of three lived in their parents’ house, according to data from the Basque Housing Observatory. According to the trend of recent years, young people become increasingly independent due to job insecurity and high house prices.
The news has been treated in the Correo group, where for the first time the number of emancipated young people before the age of 35 is below 33%, a year earlier, in 2020 35.1%. It responds to an annual trend: children are leaving their parents’ house, which was only broken in 2019. A decade earlier, in 2010, almost half of those under 35 were independent: 43.7%.
The average age of emancipation at the CAPV was 29.7 years in 2021. The study also highlights that the emancipation rate among women is higher than among men, “although women suffer worse working conditions”.
Obvious causes
The uncertainty and uncertainty that prevail in life expectancy are important obstacles to undertake the search for a new home. The Observatory’s report also refers to job insecurity and low wages: the average net wage for people aged 25 to 29 has been €1,273 and 30 to 34 years from €1,558 in 2021. That is, “far from the amount needed to access housing, especially in the capitals or in the coastal localities”.
The Observatory also refers to the “disproportionate prices” of both rental and purchase homes.
Necessary aid
In the last three years 4,369 Basque youth have come to the Official Protective Housing (1,204 for rent and 3,165 for purchase). In order to pay for renting the free market, 3,777 young people have gone to the Gaztelagun programme, which will give them a monthly grant of EUR 300 (EUR 275 until last year). The report also mentions other ways of helping.
Summer is coming, the main expression of the tourist destination, and again the problems arising from the overexploitation of the city as a tourist destination are especially visible, such as noise or the massification of the streets. However, we are more concerned about the... [+]
