Scottish Housing Market Review: Q2 2022

8. Homelessness

Over the one year period to 31 March 2021, there were 34,124 homelessness applications in Scotland and 27,915 households assessed as homeless (including those threatened with homelessness). In addition, 13,097 households were in temporary accommodation as at 31 March 2021, as illustrated in Chart 8.1.

Source: Scottish Government

More recent data outlining the first half of the 2021-22 financial year saw 17,447 homelessness applications (an annual increase of 1.6%) and 14,161 households assessed as homeless (an annual increase of 2.5%), while the number of households in temporary accommodation was 13,192 at 30 September 2021, a decrease of 6.8% compared to September 2020.

Chart 8.2 plots how homelessness applications and households in temporary accommodation have progressed since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic on a quarterly basis. This chart uses Scottish Government statistics to Q3 2021 (solid line) and Scottish Housing Regulator statistics for Q4 2021 and Q1 2022 (dashed line) due to data availability, although note that the SHR data is not directly comparable to the official homelessness statistics. The quarterly data shows that since the start of the pandemic, homelessness applications have remained below pre-pandemic levels. The 9,281 applications in Q1 2022 is 2.0% less than Q1 2020. The number of households in temporary accommodation on the other hand increased during the pandemic from 11,345 in Q4 2019 to a peak of 14,151 (+24.7%) in Q3 2020 but has since fallen to 13,375 in Q1 2022.

Source: Scottish Government and SHR