Household Projections for Scotland 2006-based

This report gives forward projections of the number of households in Scotland up to 2031, based on the estimated population of Scotland in mid-2006.

Overall change

Between 2006 and 2031, the number of households in Scotland is projected to increase by 19 per cent to 2.7 million - an average of 17,600 additional households per year.
Over the same period, Scotland’s population is projected to increase by 5 per cent. Most of the projected increase, therefore, is the result of more people living alone or in smaller households. The average household size is projected to decrease from 2.19 people in 2006 to 1.93 in 2031.
Scotland’s population is ageing, with more people in the older age groups and fewer in the younger age groups. This has an impact on household structure, as children tend to live in larger households, and older people in smaller ones.

Household type

There is a large projected increase in households containing just one adult, from 809,000 (35 per cent of all households) in 2006 to over 1.2 million (44 per cent) in 2031.
Older women are more likely than older men to live alone. But the number of men living alone is projected to increase more rapidly, from 353,000 households in 2006 to 554,000 in 2031, an increase of over a half. The number of men living alone who are aged 85 or over is projected to increase from 11,000 to 35,000.
There are also projected increases in other small households. Households containing just two adults without children are projected to rise from 687,000 to 858,000, though there is a projected 21 per cent decrease in the number of households of two or more adults in the 35-59 age groups. The number of households containing one adult with children is projected to rise from 157,000 to 226,000.
In contrast, the number of larger households is projected to fall, with households containing two or more adults with children decreasing from 443,000 (19 per cent of all households) in 2006 to 300,000 (11 per cent) by 2031. There is also a projected decrease in the number of households containing three or more adults, from 195,000 to 139,000.

Age group

Households headed by people aged 60 or over are projected to increase by over 50 per cent from 753,000 to 1.14 million between 2006 and 2031. In contrast, households headed by someone aged under 60 are projected to increase by just four per cent, to around 1.59 million. The number of households headed by someone aged 85 or over is projected to more than double over the same period, from 69,000 to 177,000.

Local authority figures

The largest projected increases in the number of households between 2006 and 2031 are in Orkney Islands, West Lothian and Edinburgh (35 per cent). Perth and Kinross, Aberdeenshire and East Lothian also have projected increases of over 30 per cent. In contrast, Inverclyde has a projected decrease of three per cent and East Dunbartonshire has a projected decrease of two per cent.