One in three Albanian households in debt, half of them live on less than 50 thousand ALL a month

One in three households in the country has at least one debt to pay off. Meanwhile, one in five of them owe money to grocery stores for food. Half of them live on less than 50 thousand ALL a month.

This is the current financial situation of Albanian households, according to the Bank of Albania. By publishing the figures concerning the first six months of this year, this institution has admitted the fact that many households in this country have difficulties to make it to the end of the month or to pay off their debts. “Around 28% of households say that they have a debt to pay. Around 83% of them have borrowed money from formal sources, while 17% from informal sources”, experts of the Bank of Albania say. “21% of these debts are owed to shops for goods that people pay at a later date”, they also say, confirming another fact which tells us a lot about the living standards of Albanian households and this has to do with the fact that expenses are higher than monthly incomes. “Growth of expenses has been higher than the growth of incomes”, the Bank of Albania argues.

Meanwhile, according to the Central Bank, 52% of Albania households have less than 50 thousand ALL to make it to the end of the month. Two days ago, the Institute of Statistics confirmed that average spending for an Albanian household is 73 thousand ALL. This shows that half of these households are unable to meet their basic needs such as food, housing, clothes, education, healthcare, etc. “Incomes for  52% of households continue to range from 17 thousand to 50 thousand ALL a month. For 27% of households, monthly incomes range from 50 thousand to 100 thousand lek”, experts of the Bank of Albania explain.