Filenews 28 November 2025
As property prices and rents rise across the EU, millions of young people who are not in a relationship or remain single face insurmountable obstacles to solving their housing problem. This unpleasant reality leads many to hasten the decision to live with a romantic partner or get married, in order to join forces financially, in the hope of being able to rent a house or an apartment or in the best case to buy their own property.
As Euronews reports in an extremely interesting report, after a brief plunge in prices in 2023, property prices swelled again in 2024 (and 2025) in the EU and jumped by 5.4% in the second quarter of 2025, according to the latest Eurostat data. And one of the social consequences is that people who are not in a relationship feel increasingly excluded from the housing market. Even from renting and creating a household.
More specifically, writes Euronews, 37% of people who live alone now believe that they will never be able to buy a house. And this is one of the key findings of a new survey among more than 20,000 people in 23 EU member states, which was conducted by the real estate company RE/MAX and shared exclusively with Europe in Motion, of Euronews.
What the research showed
According to the survey, the creation of a relationship ending in cohabitation emerges as a practical shortcut for the purchase of a house, according to 26% of respondents who intend to buy a property and is the third most frequently reported solution to the housing problem, which is intensifying throughout the Union. The percentage that answered positively to this question is higher in the Netherlands and Portugal (in both countries it was 33%).
In general, many Europeans seem to be speeding up cohabitation: 13% of couples in Europe live together after just six months, while 26% do so within a year.
"The economic situation shapes not only where people live, but also who they live with," said RE/MAX Europe CEO Michael Polzler. "While rising housing costs continue to affect everyone, those without a partner or joint income face more difficulty in obtaining housing."
However, many other Europeans are considering instead of establishing a relationship and living together... geography: 14% say moving to a cheaper area could be the way to buy a house, a strategy that is more common in Germany (20%).
According to the survey, salary is mentioned as the number one obstacle to acquiring housing (58% of the responses), with higher percentages in Poland (66%) and Hungary (67%).
According to the Euronews report, singles own far less real estate than peers who are in a relationship or have been married. While 72% of people in a couple own the house they live in, this figure drops to 49% among people who live alone.
The gap between countries is even more pronounced. Owner-occupancy rates among those living alone are significantly low in Switzerland (17%), Germany (19%) and Malta (15%). The estimated cost of housing for Europeans living alone is on average 36% of their income, including bills. In Germany it is 42% of the income of a person living alone and in the Czech Republic it exceeds 45%. In Italy, France and Spain it is about 33%.
The most convenient place to live alone in Europe is Lithuania, according to the survey, where less than a quarter of one's salary goes to housing.
