Housing, water and energy take up 25% of EU household expenses

In 2021, ‘Housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels’ represented a quarter (25.0%) of EU household expenditure and 17.1% of household expenditure in Cyprus, according to Eurostat, the statistic service of the EU.

Compared to 2020, this category showed a decline of 0.5 percentage points (pp) in the EU and of 1.1 pp in Cyprus (down from 18.2%).

The second largest share in household expenditure in Cyprus in 2021 was in the restaurants and hotels category (15.8%, having increased from 10.2 in 2020). The main largest categories in Cyprus were:

- food and non-alcoholic beverages (14.7% from 15.4%),

- transport (12.1% from 12.8%),

- miscellaneous goods and services (9.8% from 10.5%),

- recreation and culture (remained at 6.8%),

- alcoholic beverages, tobacco and narcotics (5.4% from 5.7%),

- furnishings, household equipment and routine household maintenance (5.4% from 5,8%),

- clothing and footwear (4.9% from 4.7%),

- education (3.5% from 3.9%),

- communications (2.7% from 2.9%) and

- health (2% from 3.1%).

On the EU level, ‘Food and non-alcoholic beverages’ was the category with the second largest share in household expenditure in 2021. This share also decreased by 0.5 pp, representing 14.3% of total expenditure in 2021.

Transport ranked third in household expenditure categories, representing 12.1% of the total expenditure, up 0.5 pp. This increase is related to the phase-out of COVID-19-related control measures that affected mobility all through the EU.

The same tendency was noted in the ‘Recreation and culture’, ‘Restaurants and hotels’, ‘Health’ and ‘Clothing and footwear’ categories; their total expenditure share increased to 8.0%, 6.6%, 4.7% and 4.2% in 2021 (compared to 7.8%, 6.0%, 4.6% and 4.1% respectively in 2020).

The shares of ‘Furnishings and household equipment’ as well as ‘Education’ costs were stable, representing 6.0% and 0.9% of the total expenditure, the same as in 2020.

Total expenditure shares of ‘Alcoholic beverages, tobacco and narcotics’, and ‘Miscellaneous goods and services’ went down by 0.2 pp for both categories, while for ‘Communications’ by 0.1 pp.