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Published: 21 May 2008

Almost one million singles

According to Statistics Finland's latest data on housing conditions the total number of household-dwelling units in Finland at the end of 2007 was 2,476,500, and 999,800, or 40 per cent, of them consisted of one person. The average size of a household-dwelling unit was 2.10 persons. As late as in 1970 the average size was still three persons. The size of a household-dwelling unit varied regionally. In urban municipalities the average size was 2.01 persons and in rural municipalities 2.26 persons. The structure of household-dwelling units differed between rural and urban areas. The share of one-person household-dwelling units was larger in urban areas (43.1%) than in rural areas (35.7%).

At the end of 2007, household-dwelling units living in an overcrowded dwelling numbered 231,000 and the total number of persons living in such dwellings was 958,000. A household-dwelling unit is defined as living in an overcrowded dwelling if it has more than one person per one room of its dwelling, so a person living alone cannot be regarded as living in an overcrowded dwelling. One-person household-dwelling units excluded, 16 per cent of the rest of the household-dwelling units and almost one person in four lived in an overcrowded dwelling. The number of household-dwelling units living in an overcrowded dwelling fell by 5,000 and the number of persons living in an overcrowded dwelling by 21,000 from the year before.

The average floor area of dwelling per household-dwelling unit was 80.5 square metres, or 38.3 square metres per person. The floor area per person diminishes considerably as the size of the household-dwelling grows. The average area available for a single person living alone is 57.7 square metres, a two-person household-dwelling unit has 43 square metres per person but a household-dwelling unit of six persons has no more than 20.8 square metres of floor area per person.

Household-dwelling units by number of persons in 1960 - 2007

	Household- dwelling units total	Household- dwelling units of 1 person	Household- dwelling units of 2 persons	Household- dwelling units of 3+ persons
1960	1,204,385	188,995	245,921	769,469
1970	1,420,723	288,970	323,640	808,113
1980	1,781,771	482,476	457,667	841,628
1990	2,036,732	646,229	597,928	792,575
2000	2,295,386	856,746	722,437	716,203
2007	2,476,505	999,812	811,596	665,097

Source: Household-dwelling units and housing conditions 2007. Statistics Finland

Inquiries: Ms Elina Aspblad-Huohvanainen +358 9 1734 3232, asuminen.tilasto@stat.fi

Director in charge: Mr Jari Tarkoma

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Last updated 21.5.2008