Thread by @ONS

When you think about your income, spending, savings, and any property you own, do you consider yourself richer or poorer than average? 💰

Use our new calculator which compares your financial situation with other households (data is from pre #COVID19) 🧮 ow.ly/bYZ650IeIJp

1 in 3 households spent more than their income before #COVID19 💳

Some households may be able to maintain higher spending by using financial buffers accumulated over their lifetime, but others may need to make cutbacks, or borrow, to make up the shortfall.

Smaller households were the most likely to be spending more than their income and those not retired lacked a sufficient financial buffer.

A financial buffer is made up of cash (money in current accounts), savings and other easy-to-access assets such as shares.

Households in the North East were vulnerable to budgets being squeezed.

They were among the most likely to be overspending (39%), with a financial buffer that would last only seven months on average.

Around 2 million British households (7%) were in poverty for income, spending and financial wealth before #COVID19.

Households were most commonly in financial wealth poverty (42%).

Among UK regions and countries:

▪️ the North East of England had the highest rate of financial wealth poverty before #COVID19 (51%), and the South East had the lowest (33%)
▪️ households in the West Midlands were the most likely to be in poverty for all measures (11%).

People living alone were the least likely to be in all three types of poverty, while parents were the most likely.

Lone parent households were worst off, with almost a third (31%) in poverty for income, spending and financial wealth ow.ly/bYZ650IeIJp