According to the latest forecast published by the INE, the Spanish population will increase by 4.23 million people over the next 15 years. Consequently, the number of households will grow by 2.73 million, provided the current trend continues.
INE also predicts that households in Spain will continue to shrink. By 2037, there will be more than 51 million people in the country and 21.65 million households. On January 1, 2022, there were 47,435,597 people.
In percentage terms, the number of households will grow by 14.5% over the next 15 years, faster than that of residents (8.9%). This means that the family size will continue to decrease. “The average household size would therefore go from the current 2.48 to 2.36 people in 2037,” the statistics office said. In 2012, the average size was 2.57 inhabitants.
Single-person homes
INE predicts that single-person households will experience the greatest growth in this period, both in absolute and relative terms. For example, in 2037 there could be 6.5 million single-person homes (29.8% of the total). That is an increase of 27.3% compared to the beginning of 2022. As a result, single people will make up 10.7% of the total population in 2022 and 12.5% in 2037.
The prototype family, which consists of two people, will cover nearly 7 million households by 2037. That is an increase of 22% from 2022. Within 15 years, households in which two people live will make up almost a third of the total (32.3%).
Triple households
Households with three people would show a more moderate increase (4.3%, to four million and account for 18.5%), while households with five or more inhabitants would grow 5% (to 1.16 million units and 5. 4% of the total).
Decrease in four-person homes
On the other hand, the number of families of four will fall: according to the INE, from 2022 to 2037 it will decrease by 4.1% to about 3.04 million and remain at 14.1% of the total, compared to the 16, 8% they represent in 2022.
Asturias is the only region to lose households
Looking at the data by Autonomous Community, it can be seen that the number of households will generally increase in Spain except for Asturias. Relatively speaking, the largest growth in the number of households would occur in the Balearic Islands (27%), Murcia (22.6%) and the Community of Madrid (21.8%). This is followed by the Canary Islands (21.5%), the Valencian Community (18.5%), Navarra (17%) and Catalonia (17%).
The rest of the regions will already be below the national average. That is, the increase in the number of households will be less than 14.5%. Andalucia, Aragon, Castilla-La Mancha and La Rioja also registered double-digit increases in the number of households, while Galicia (5%), Extremadura (3.1%), Castilla y León (1.9%) and the autonomous city of Ceuta (0.6%) will lead to the most moderate increases.
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Asturias is the only region where the number of households could decline (in the order of 0.8%, according to the INE). However, this region would lead the ranking of the autonomous regions with the most single-person households (with 36.2% of the total in 2037), followed by Castilla y León (35.5%) and Extremadura (33.4%). By contrast, Murcia would be the region with the lowest percentage of single-person households (24.8%), followed by the Balearic Islands (26%) and the Canary Islands (27.3%).
Average household size is declining across the country
The only trend that seems to be seen across Spain is that of a decrease in average household size. The most pronounced contraction, according to the INE projection, will occur in Extremadura, Andalusia and Castilla y León, while the most moderate declines will occur in the Balearic Islands, Catalonia and La Rioja.
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