A personal loan from a bank or other financial institution is the most widely used form of borrowing in Europe, according to a survey by ING.
Nearly a quarter (24.9%) of European households have a personal loan from a recognised financial institution, whereas 21% rely on credit cards and 14% are regularly overdrawn on the household bank account.
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The survey polled over 12,000 people across 12 European countries and also took account of whether households had savings or not.
ING found that households without savings tend to rely heavily on credit cards to see them through sudden financial crises – across all survey respondents, 30% of those without savings have credit card debt compared with 18% of those with savings.
One of the highlights of the survey was that 40% of the interviewees said their household had no personal debt whatsoever.
In terms of individual countries, Turkey had the highest proportion of people in debt, with only 19.1% saying they had no personal debt, whereas respondents in The Netherlands were least likely to be in debt, with 63% saying their household had no debt.
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