Young people moving house more often, possibly due to return of basic study grant

The number of young adults aged 17 to 22 who moved house increased significantly last year compared to 2022, Statistics Netherlands (CBS) reported based on new figures. “This may be due to the reintroduction of the basic study grant,” the statistics office said. The higher study grant gave students more options to move out of their parents’ homes.

Last year, 96,300 young adults moved to a different address, compared to 83,000 in 2022. In the Dutch population as a whole, the number of relocations increased slightly last year, by 1.6 percent to 1.73 million people moving house.

Moving house is often linked to events in a person’s life that bring about a change in housing preferences. Many of these changes occur in the 18- to 35-year-old age group, like students moving out of their parents' homes, couples moving in together, and then moving to a bigger home when they start a family. For that reason, this age group moves more than older age groups.

“That was also the case in 2023,” CBS said. “The 25-year-olds moved the most: over a quarter went to live somewhere else.” People aged 60 moved the least - less than 5 percent relocated last year.

Despite last year’s increase, relatively few Netherlands residents moved house compared to the peak year of 2017, when 1.88 million people relocated. But the slight increase did stabilize the decreasing trend that’s been happening since 2017. The housing shortage likely plays a role in this - people want to move, but can’t find a suitable and affordable home.

Looking at the proportion of the population, the most relocations happened in the second half of the 1990s, with around 11 percent of Dutch people moving house. The fewest happened at the end of the credit crisis in 2013, with only 8.8 percent relocating. Last year, 9.7 percent of the Dutch population moved house.

“Because the Dutch population grew by 2.5 million between 1995 and 2024, the number of people who moved fell less quickly than the percentage of people who moved.”