Trends in people needing emergency temporary accommodation
About 2 mins
Key points
- In 2024 there were 124,000 households living in temporary accommodation. This has more than doubled since 2011.
- More than three-fifths of households in temporary accommodation were households with children.
Being threatened with homelessness is a stressful experience, linked to psychological distress and depression.
This chart shows the number of households that have been placed in temporary accommodation in England since 2002 – people who have been classed by their local authority as being, or at risk of becoming, homeless and in need. The data include households with and without children, and households placed in unsuitable accommodation.
- 2024 saw the fastest year-on-year rise in households in temporary accommodation (14% to 123,560). The proportion of households with children in temporary accommodation is now lower at 64% than the peak of 79% in 2016, but has increased continuously since 2021.
- From 2005 to 2011, the number of households in temporary accommodation fell by around 50%, which may reflect a change in legislation in 2002. This legislation stipulated that local authorities had a statutory obligation to reduce and prevent homelessness.
- Between 2011 and 2020, the number of households in temporary accommodation rose steadily, alongside changes to the social security system. This includes a reduction in housing benefits that did not rise in line with increasing private rent costs.
- During the COVID-19 pandemic, there was no significant increase in the number of households in temporary accommodation. However, there was a sharp spike in households without children claiming temporary accommodation between 2019 and 2021 – a 50% increase compared with 2019. This was due to efforts to place people sleeping rough in temporary accommodation at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in the first lockdown.
- In 2023 and 2024, the number of households in temporary accommodation increased again, particularly for households with children. This may be due to the continued increase in rents and the end to the moratorium (temporary suspension) on evictions that was in place during the pandemic.
From April 2018, the Homelessness Reduction Act (HRA) broadened priority-need eligibility, with the intention of preventing homelessness. This legislation qualifies people for access to services, emergency housing or in some cases longer-term housing. It also extended the time for people to become eligible for help before they lose their home. It is too early to fully judge the effectiveness of these new measures, but the number of households in temporary accommodation has continued to rise since 2018.
- The data in the chart are administrative statistics, reflecting the actions taken by local authorities to address homelessness. This means they may be subject to local differences in recording practice and issues around informal local restrictions (gatekeeping) in who can access the services.
- Temporary accommodation is accommodation funded by councils that is typically a private flat, a council or housing association flat, a room in a bed and breakfast establishment or a hostel.
- Unsuitable accommodation has been defined as accommodation that is not separate and self-contained. It also includes situations where toilets, personal washing facilities or cooking facilities are shared by one or more households. For this analysis, this includes households placed in bed and breakfast establishments, hostels and where no accommodation has been allocated.
- The numbers presented are annual averages of quarterly data.
Source: Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, Statutory homelessness tables, 2002 to 2024
