Over 11mn homes lie empty in Europe: Report

More than 11 million homes are empty in Europe while millions of people are in dire need of housing across the continent, a new report shows.

According to the report, published by British daily The Guardian on Sunday, there are over 3.4 million vacant homes only in Spain.

France and Italy come next, with each reporting about 2 million of such houses.

There are also some 1.8 million and 700,000 vacant residences lying across Germany and the UK respectively.

David Ireland, chief executive of the Empty Homes charity, described the figures as “shocking” and “incredible.”

“Homes are built for people to live in, if they’re not being lived in then something has gone seriously wrong with the housing market,” he said.

Freek Spinnewijn, director of FEANTSA, the European Federation of National Organizations working with the Homeless, also said that only “half” of the vacant housing is needed to end the problem of “homelessness” in Europe.

According to statistics by the European Union, there are currently about 4.1 million homeless people across Europe.

The continent plunged into a financial crisis in early 2008. The worsening debt crisis has forced the EU governments to adopt harsh austerity measures and tough economic reforms.