Young Canary Islanders need to allocate 126.5% of their salary to rent a home alone, according to the Observatory of Emancipation 2025 report, presented this Wednesday by the Spanish Youth Council.
The report places the youth emancipation rate in the Canary Islands (from 16 to 29 years old) at 15.4%, one of the lowest in the historical series, and attributes this situation mainly to the increase in housing costs, both for rent and purchase.
The technician and researcher of the study, Manuel Mejías, explained at a press conference that the average rent in the islands reached 1,224 euros per month in 2025, 8% more than the previous year, while the real salaries of the young population have barely grown by 6% since 2008.
"A young person must allocate 126.5% of their salary if they want to rent a home alone. That is to say, their salary is not enough; they have to rely on family resources, whoever has them, or other types of mechanisms," stated Mejías.
Furthermore, he indicated that "if a young Canary Islander wants to access a home of their own, they will allocate close to 85% of their salary to the mortgage payment" and will need to allocate 5.5 years of their gross salary for the down payment.
13.3% More Emancipated Young People Share Flats
The study also indicates that almost half of young Canary Islanders (46.6%) who rent share a flat, and this modality has increased by 13.3 percentage points compared to 2024.
Mejías explained that women are the ones who leave home earlier and that young people with higher education are in a "better starting position," although it tends to be delayed.
Additionally, young people who have already entered the labor market – whether employed or unemployed – show higher emancipation (26.5%) compared to those who are inactive, mostly studying, whose emancipation rate in 2025 was 3.8%.
However, he warned that "employment today does not protect with the same intensity as it did in past decades; 25.6% of young Canary Islanders who are employed are at risk of poverty or social exclusion."
The researcher also highlighted that 28.2% of young people with owned homes acquired them without a mortgage, compared to 13.1% with a mortgage, while 24.2% did so through free transfer.
On the other hand, he has pointed out that without social benefits -educational, rent assistance, unemployment, etc-, the poverty of emancipated youth, currently at 25.8% in the islands, would rise to 39.7%.
Rent as a factor of impoverishment
The president of the Spanish Youth Council, Sara Villodre, has warned that the situation in the Canary Islands reproduces a state trend marked by limited access to housing.
As she explained, the youth emancipation rate in Spain stood at 14.5% in 2025, the lowest level since these reports began to be compiled in 2006.
"Rent is emerging as that factor of impoverishment for many young people and, in fact, the risk of poverty increases for young people from 25.9% to 43% after paying for that housing," Villodre pointed out.
The president of the Youth Council in the Canary Islands, Eliana Parrilla, has called on public administrations for housing policies "with a budget, timeline, and verifiable results" and has criticized that current rent subsidies "often arrive late and poorly".
"We cannot continue responding to structural problems with exclusively temporary measures," Parrilla stated, adding that "we do not need more institutional or political announcements, nor for it to remain solely in headlines."
The Emancipation Observatory has introduced a methodological change this year by replacing the Active Population Survey (EPA), on which it was based until now, with the annual Survey of Living Conditions (ECV), in order to improve the comparability and analysis of the social conditions of youth.
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