Nearly 15% of Romanians - unable to pay some major current expenses on time in 2024 (statistics)

Nearly 15% of households in Romania were unable, in 2024, to pay on time, in at least one instance, some major current expenses (housing maintenance, loan installments, utility bills, etc.) due to unsatisfactory financial situations, according to data compiled by the National Institute of Statistics (INS), Agerpres reports.

Among the payments for which arrears were recorded last year, the most frequent cases (94.9%) involved housing maintenance (water, gas, heating, electricity, etc.).

"Paying bank installments is a priority for every household. Nevertheless, 9.8% of households reported that, due to a poor financial situation, they fell behind on payments for various loans (other than loans for purchasing their primary residence). The lower share of these arrears is mainly explained by the specific nature of these types of payments, which penalize missed deadlines more severely, as well as the lower frequency of households with loans to repay," according to the results of a quality-of-life survey conducted by INS.

According to the source, in 2024, the share of households with arrears decreased by 1.2 percentage points compared to the previous year, with declines of 0.8 percentage points in urban areas and 1.7 percentage points in rural areas.

In rural areas, 16.5% of households reported that during the past year there was at least one situation in which they were unable to pay on time some of these important current expenses, three percentage points higher than households in urban areas. While urban households more frequently encountered arrears for housing maintenance (93.1% of households), in rural areas the highest share of arrears was also for housing maintenance (96.8% of households).

As in 2023, the phenomenon of arrears in 2024 was more widespread among households with dependent children (17.2%), single-parent households with at least one minor child (28.7%), and households with two adults and three or more minor children (29.4%).

Depending on the occupational status of the household head, other categories of non-employed individuals (students, homemakers, and other inactive persons) were in the most difficult situation, with 40.8% of households unable to pay their due amounts on time. Among these, 93.3% recorded at least one arrear for housing maintenance expenses (water, gas, heating, electricity, etc.).

Almost a quarter of households (24.7%) reported that they faced major or significant difficulties covering current household expenses. Considering also the households that stated they faced some difficulty (42.6%), more than two-thirds of all households encountered such challenges, less so in urban areas (63.5%) and more so in rural areas (72.1%).

INS data also shows that the highest shares of households struggling "with great difficulty" or "with difficulty" were those whose household head was aged 75 or older (34.7%), those aged 65-74 (28.9%), and households where the head belongs to other categories of non-employed persons (52.4%). By household type, households with two adults and three or more children faced the greatest or very great difficulty in paying current expenses (43.9%).

By development regions, the lowest share of households reporting that they faced difficulties "with great difficulty" or "with difficulty" was recorded in the North-West region (16.5%), while the highest share was recorded in the South-East region (32.9%).