At the height of the pandemic, private companies and the civil service implemented a WFH policy due to the movement restrictions imposed to curb the spread of the Covid-19 virus.

According to KRI’s report, titled “The State of Households 2024: Households and the Pandemic 2019-2022”, real expenditures on housing and utilities grew by 10% between 2019 and 2022.

Spending on furnishings and household maintenance, meanwhile, increased by 14%.

KRI said the surge was more pronounced among urban households, which saw a 12.5% increase in housing and utilities expenses and a 17.2% rise in furnishings and maintenance during the pandemic years.

Most income deciles, particularly the highest, saw increased growth in housing and utilities expenditure.

KRI also noted that ICT-related expenditure steadily increased over the years, with the sharpest increase in real terms to RM397 in 2022 from RM266 in 2019.

There was also higher growth in ICT expenditure among rural households at 26% compared to urban households at 22.5% between 2014 and 2022, with the steepest increase in the 2019-2022 period.

“This may be attributed to rural households needing to accommodate for increased WFH and remote-learning policies during the pandemic,” it said.

The report found that households allocated the largest share of their monthly expenditures to four fundamental necessities during the pandemic – housing and utilities (23.2%), food at home (16.3%), dining out (15.3%) and transportation (11.3%).

Housing and utilities have become the largest expenditure category since 2004, surpassing food consumed at home, it said.