Rising rents, high moving costs hammer Hong Kong families stuck in subdivided flats
- Hong Kong Council of Social Service survey finds one-third of respondents spend at least half of their salary on rent for subdivided flats
- Moving resulted in a rent increase for more than half of one-person households but higher prices did not mean a better living environment
Low-income households face high moving costs and rising rents for subdivided flats in Hong Kong, a survey has found, prompting an NGO to propose setting up a platform to help tenants better understand market conditions.
A survey by the Hong Kong Council of Social Service found that one-third of 2,108 people polled spent at least half of their salary on rent for subdivided flats.
The poll, conducted from June last year to January 2021, found that 70 per cent of low-income families with children lived below the poverty line and 34 per cent had moved in the past three years to try to find a subdivided flat with better living conditions.
Peace Wong Wo-ping, the council’s chief officer for policy research and advocacy, said 30 per cent of households with children were single-parent families, more than 70 per cent of which lived below the poverty line.
“Even with limited resources they still had to move in the hope of giving their family a better place to live, but there aren’t many choices in the city for them,” Wong said on Sunday.