Leaving the nest is complicated and, if you are between 18 and 30 years old, you will know that becoming independent and leaving your parents’ house in Spain is tremendously difficult. There are many factors that influence such as the salarieshe house pricethe rents through the roofthe insecurity in some contracts and even cultural reasons. But no, it is not a reality only in Spain.

And in this map we can see the average age at which young Europeans leave their parents’ home, which varies greatly between the north and south of the continent.

The earliest. The map, prepared by Landgeist with the most recent data Eurostatshows us this reality in which countries like Finland (at 21.4 years), Denmark (at 21.8 years) and Sweden (at 21.8 years) are those that represent the lowest average age. Their young people leave home early, very early, but it is something that also happens in Norway (22.5 years old) or Estonia (at 22.8 years old).

We have already talked about this phenomenon before, with the percentage of people between 25 and 34 years old who live with parents minuscule in that northern area (below 5% of them). And it is a reality that, further south, it is a reality.

The lazy ones. This percentage of young people who live with their parents increases as we look down to the south. In Spain it is close to 40%, but it is not the country where the nest is abandoned later. The average age at which we become independent is 30.4 years, very similar to the 29.1 years or 30 in Portugal and Italy, respectively.

In the Balkans, the scenario is very different. According to these data, young Montenegrins take the cake, leaving their parents’ house at 33.3 years old. In North Macedonia they leave home at 32.1 years old and Croatians become independent at 31.8 years old. In the central area of ​​Europe the average age is between 23 and 25 years, and there are a couple of factors that explain this enormous difference between the north and the south.

Cultural factors. The first thing is that we cannot ignore the family and collective culture of countries like Spain, Italy, Greece or Croatia, among others in southern and eastern Europe. Young people tend to stay longer at home due to strong intergenerational ties, the idea that young people support the family and because, when they pursue higher education, they stay longer in the family home to reduce costs.

And economical. But beyond family ties, there is something irremediably linked to that middle age of emancipation: money. This idea of ​​family ties is almost romantic, but the reality is that getting a job in certain countries is complicated, which leads to a high rate of youth unemployment, so cannot access housing and, as a result, economic dependence on parents is forced.

In northern countries such as Sweden, Denmark or Finland, there are social policies that, thanks to educational subsidies (directly free in some universities) and more accessible housing, allows for earlier independence. The labor market is also different, which encourages young people to leave home when they begin their higher education or start working.

In any case, it is a crisis that seems to have no end and whose responsible, according to young people of some of the most affected countries, are the rulers themselves. Besides, there is no hope in an improvement of the situation in the short term.