National Records of Scotland

Estimates of Households and Dwellings in Scotland, 2019

Last update: 18 June 2020
Next update: June 2021

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Data

Charts

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Key Findings:

The number of households in Scotland continued to increase in 2019, reaching 2.50 million, an increase of 143,800 (6.1%) over the last ten years.
More than a third of households are single person households, and an estimated 906,000 people are living alone.
The growth in the number of households is partly due to an increase in the population, but also because people are increasingly living alone or with fewer other people.
The number of households has increased in every council area over the last ten years, with the greatest relative increases occurring in Midlothian (16%), Orkney Islands (11%) and East Lothian (11%).
There were 2.64 million dwellings in Scotland in 2019. A total of 84,600 dwellings (three per cent of all dwellings) were empty, including 41,100 classified as long-term (more than six months) empty and 43,600 as unoccupied exemptions (such as new homes yet to be occupied and dwellings undergoing repair or awaiting demolition). A further one per cent (24,500) of dwellings were second homes.
Empty and second homes are concentrated in different parts of the country. For example, remote rural areas have a higher percentage of empty and second homes than urban areas.

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