Between 71.1 and 72.8 per cent of people in rural Cyprus lived in homes with more rooms, mainly bedrooms, than their households needed in 2025, against 41.3 per cent in rural areas across the EU, Eurostat figures show. Together with Ireland and Belgium, Cyprus is in the group of EU countries with the highest shares, and only the Netherlands recorded a higher one, at 73.3 per cent.
Eurostat calls such homes under-occupied dwellings. Across the EU, 33.4 per cent of people lived in them in 2025. The share was 35.6 per cent in towns and suburbs and 26.2 per cent in cities.
The latest Eurostat figures show significant differences in living conditions, income and housing between large urban centres and the countryside. They compare three types of area: cities, towns and suburbs, and rural areas. In 2025, 92.7 million people in the EU, about 20.9 per cent of the population, were at risk of poverty or social exclusion. The rate was 21.4 per cent in rural areas, 21.0 per cent in cities and 20.4 per cent in towns and suburbs. The indicator covers more than income, Eurostat notes: risk of poverty, severe material and social deprivation, and living in a household with very low work intensity.
Overcrowding, meaning living in a home without the minimum number of rooms for the number and make-up of its residents, stood at 16.8 per cent across the EU in 2025. It was 20.4 per cent in cities, 14.8 per cent in towns and suburbs and 14.2 per cent in rural areas. Cyprus differs from most member states. Eurostat says that, together with Greece, it is an exception, with overcrowding higher in towns and suburbs and lowest in rural areas.
