Produced by The Housing Agency using local authority data, the annual Summary of Social Housing Assessments (SSHA) brings together information provided by local authorities on households that are qualified for social housing support but whose social housing need is not currently being met. It is a point-in-time assessment of the identified need for social housing support across the country.
The SSHA 2020 report can be read here.
Among the key findings of SSHA 2020 are:
- The number of households with an unmet social housing need fell by 10% in 2020, to 61,880.
- 25 of 31 local authorities recorded fewer households on their lists than in 2019. An additional 354 households were identified across the six local authorities where the number with an unmet need for social housing had increased.
- More than four-in-ten households with an unmet social housing need live in the four Dublin local authorities.
- The majority of unmet need is in small households: single adult households account for over half of those with an unmet need for social housing (52%), while nearly a quarter are lone parent households (24%).
- The number of households waiting longer is falling; the share of households waiting for more than four years fell by almost four percentage points (from 48.7% to 44.8%). Conversely, the share of households waiting for fewer than two years increased by 1.6 percentage points (from 33.8% to 35.4%).