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Household Finance and Consumption Survey

The main aim of the Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS) is to gather information on household economic wellbeing.

The HFCS survey was first conducted in Ireland in 2013. Below are some headline results from the 2018 survey, the second report in the series.

Table 1 Summary of results
	Households with asset/debt	Median value ¹
	%	€000's
Real assets
Household Main Residence (HMR)	68.8	250.0
Land	8.9	319.4
Other Real Estate Property	13.6	240.6
Self Employment Business Wealth	17.7	19.3
Vehicles	78.8	8.0
Valuables	79.0	5.0
Any Real Asset	95.8	226.3

Financial assets
Savings	94.6	5.0
Bond or Mutual funds	10.0	10.0
Shares	10.4	10.0
Voluntary Pension	15.8	49.6
Other Financial Asset	5.9	10.0
Any Financial Asset	94.9	7.9

Debt
Mortgage on HMR	26.1	124.9
Mortgage on Other Property	7.3	153.9
Non-mortgage loan	30.4	6.2
Overdraft	7.9	0.8
Credit Card debt	12.7	1.4
Any Debt	51.8	45.9
¹Conditional on participation.

Open in Excel: Table 1 - Household Finance and Consumption Survey 2018 Summary Table (XLS 11KB)

%	Valuables	Vehicles	Self Employment Business Wealth	Other Real Estate Property	Land	HMR
2018	2.7	2.6	4.2	15.5	14.4	60.5
2013	2	2.9	6.1	14.4	21.4	53.3

¹ Real assets are physical assets that have value due to their substance and properties. Real assets include precious metals, commodities, real estate, agricultural land, machinery and oil. Real assets are different to financial assets.

X-axis label	Voluntary Pension	Shares	Bonds or Mutual Funds	Other Financial Asset (apart from savings)
Primary or below	4	4	5.3	2.2
Lower secondary	11.6	4.7	5	3.9
Higher secondary	12.2	5.5	9.5	3.6
Post leaving cert	14.2	7	9.2	4.4
Third level non degree	18.5	8.8	11.4	8.1
Third level degree or above	23.7	18.4	13.9	9.2

¹ A financial asset is a non-physical asset whose value is derived from a contractual claim, such as bank deposits, bonds, and stocks.

Net Wealth Thresholds

“Net Wealth” is defined as the sum of real and financial assets less debt. “Debt” includes mortgages, loans, credit cards and overdrafts. Households with a wealth value greater than €827,000 belong to the wealthiest 10% of all households (the top net wealth decile). Households in the bottom 10% of the net wealth distribution have a net wealth value less than €1,000 (see Table 2).

Table 2 Net wealth decile threshold limits
Net Wealth Decile	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	9th	10th
Net Wealth Threshold (€,000)	<1	<11	<56	<115	<178	<251	<338	<499	<827	>827

Open in Excel: Table 2 - Household Finance and Consumption Survey 2018 (XLS 9KB)

Intergenerational transfer of Wealth

One in ten (10%) households in the first decile said they had ever received a substantial gift or inheritance, compared to about 67% of households in the tenth decile.

Property and another substantial asset were received by 6.9% of households in the tenth decile, an additional 29.4% received property only and just over 30% received a substantial asset that was not property (e.g. money), (see Figure 3).

	% of Households that received non-property only	% of Households that received property and non-property	% of Households that received property only
1	9.7	0	0.338
2	8.4	0	1.6
3	11.6	0.7	3.5
4	14.4	0.2	18.1
5	12	0.8	16.4
6	11.2	0.7	15.8
7	21.5	3.2	13.7
8	24.4	1.8	14.3
9	25.5	4.2	25.6
10	30.5	6.9	29.4

Who uses these results?

The HFCS is a very important survey because it tells us if there are disparities or differences between household assets and liabilities (e.g. negative equity). The HFCS also tells us about the types and levels of debt taken on by households (e.g. home equity, credit card debt, etc.) and what factors influence household debt.

The data will ensure that policymakers use the most complete information possible when making decisions that will affect us all. The CSO will never publish data that could allow any individual or household be identified. The confidentiality of your data is guaranteed by law under the Statistics Act, 1993.