Referenced by 4 other explainers
Household type shows how people live together at home. It looks at who shares each home.
These figures are Place Forecast estimates based on Census data published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
The six types are:
Most homes fall into one of these six types. Each home is counted once.
Two ABS household groups are not shown here. They are Visitor only households and Other non-classifiable households. ABS does not release these at the small-area level, so they cannot flow into the small-area figures. As a result the total here sits a few per cent below the full ABS household count for the area.
These figures only include occupied private dwellings. They do not include empty homes or non-private dwellings such as hotels, hospitals, aged-care homes, or hostels.
ABS does not publish a Not stated count for household type. Non-responses are classified into the published totals.
When a household has more than one family, the Census records it using the primary family. For example, take a household with grandparents, parents and children. It may still appear as a couple family with children. It depends on how the relationships are coded.
This page shows broad household types only. Other ABS datasets show more detail. They cover same-sex couples, de facto couples, step-families, and blended families.
These groups follow ABS classification rules. They do not reflect how people describe or understand their own family.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander kinship and many culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) homes share care across many adults and homes. The six ABS groups do not capture either pattern.
See the marker methodology for how these figures are built and its limits.
The ABS adjusts small counts to protect privacy. This can shift a number a little. It is called perturbation.
Treat small-area figures as patterns, not exact counts. Check them with the relevant community-controlled organisation. This follows Indigenous Data Sovereignty principles.