Why do so many more adult men than adult women still live with their parents?

[Tsort]

Obviously, COVID and CoL have had a severe impact on young people’s ability to leave home, regardless of gender. However, the percentage of young men at home is so much higher. These are the percentages for 2021 (according to Statista), as you’ll see, the difference starts to get quite striking in the mid-20’s.

Age Male Female
34 11% 3%
33 11%. 2%
32 13% 5%
31 14% 6%
30 15% 6%
29 19% 9%
28 25% 12%
27 30% 13%
26 36% 21%
25 43% 25%
24 56% 40%
23 56% 50%
22 65% 54%
21 67% 50%
20 64% 57%
19 81% 76%
18 92% 89%

So, what gives, do you think? Is it the old trope of useless man children who can’t cope on their own? Is it that women more likely to want their independence? Something else?

If you are only prepared to look at one source that says only what you want it to say then you have a closed.

I always liked the quote
“There are three kinds of lies: Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics”

and any statistics that are about averages across a life time really don't mean that much.

The stats provided aren’t averaged over a lifetime. They are for specific age ranges in a specific time period. You’d know this if you’d actually read them.

You’ve been provided with two sources, one of which is the Office of National Statistics. Your source appears to be ‘I read something somewhere, sometime, you can Google it’. So if you are only prepared to look at one source that says only what you want it to say then you have a closed mind is clearly you talking about yourself.

You're making yourself look extremely silly, at this point.

Tsort

That's OK because your not coming across any better.

'Substitute you for my mum, at least I'll get my washing done.'

Domestic services, that's why.

To be honest if that 'one source' is the ONS, an internationally recognised organisation that is completely impartial whose sole purpose is to just report on the raw data it has gathered using benchmark methods then you have to be a bit of a muppet to discard it just because their research does not align with your viewpoint.

I think you’ll find I’m coming across just fine and you’re being called a bit of a muppet.

I think there will be a lot of different factors contributing to this.

It would be interesting to see the statistics beyond the age of 34 and see if there is a point at which the gap between males and females closes. I think the point about women often being in relationships with older men is likely to be a contributor, women may be more likely to move into their first home with a partner in their early to mid twenties whereas men may be in their mid to late twenties or beyond. Because statistically men are usually a few years older than women in relationships men may always be a few years behind women in terms of moving into their first home. Although obviously that won’t account for such a significant difference.

Women are apparently 35% more likely to go to uni than men, I think going to uni is the start of living independently for a lot of young people and those who don’t have that experience and instead go straight from school to work are probably likely to move out at an older age. Once you’ve lived independently from parents it is hard to go back to that long term so people who’ve been to university and lived independently will likely continue to do so, and of course those who go to university will often make links in new towns and cities. It often makes financial sense to stay living with a parent if they live locally to the area you’re in but it’s not really an option if you want to live and work elsewhere in the UK.

Men are also more likely to have a learning disabilities or other conditions such as autism which might make it more difficult for them to live independently. About two thirds of pupils in special schools for pupils with learning difficulties tend to be male. For this demographic it may mean they are ready to move out at an older age than their peers, or not at all. Anecdotally I have several friends who have an adult brother with a learning disability of some kind still living at home.

In cases where a young couple have had a child and then split up then the woman is more likely to be the resident parent and thus more likely to be offered social housing enabling her to move out from home or keep the existing house where perhaps the man can’t. Men are probably more likely to stay living at home or go back to living at home in these cases.

Affording a home as a single person is also difficult. Single men outnumber single women, apparently around 54% of the single (never married) population is male. So again there is a larger pool of single men to be living at home than there are single women.

It’s probably a combination of lots of these factors and more which means men are more likely to be living at home than down to just one thing, I definitely don’t think it’s as simplistic as just thinking men are more likely to want to live with a woman to do their cooking and cleaning, although I do think the posts pointing out that there are differences in how men and women are socialised in terms of being independent and domestically able are valid as are the suggestions the experience of an adult man living at home with parents in terms of respect and privacy may be different to that of a woman.

Women have typically married younger than men so that could have something to do with it.

Women in general get their shit together sooner than men do due to the pressure of our childbearing years running out.

Some of these responses are very snide.

My own DS is 31 and has been back living with us for almost 5 years because he can't afford to live alone. He doesn't want to be here and we don't want him here but with a room in a shared house now £800 pm he's stuck.

Single men are extremely low priority for housing, so until he meets someone to share with he isn't going anywhere.

Most women that I know in their thirties live with their husbands or boyfriends. He is the higher earner and without him they would likely, still be in the parental home. I am in the south east and don't recognise a lot of the comments on this thread as don't match what I see in my area or social groups.

That 15% is 3.0m families. Of which 2.6m are the female parent. At 21, 0.2m females don’t live with their parents. Perfectly feasible that a material proportion of those 0.2m are in that 2.6m. As with the other young adult ages. And many won’t necessarily be the breakdown of a co-habiting relationship. The fathers aren’t moving back to their parents - they never moved out.