Asylum hotels cost £2.1bn a year.
Asylum hotels cost you £2.1bn a year. Where people are placed, who profits, and what it really costs, audited numbers, not rumours.
14 figures, each with its official source.
21% of supported asylum seekers; down 35% year-on-year.
75% of the total, most supported asylum seekers are not in hotels.
Migration Observatory estate average, it fell within the year as occupancy rose. The Home Office's own point estimate is higher at ~£145/night (used in the value-for-money figures); both are averages over different bases. Either way, roughly six times the ~£23 dispersal rate.
Not in a statistical release, from ministerial statements/press releases, and the figure changes. ~210 in mid-2025, ~185 by April 2026; peak was over 400.
Hotels only, FY2024-25 (≈£5.75m/day). From the NAO Oct 2025 Overview: NOT the May 2025 contracts report, whose £1.3bn covered only the first seven months.
Clearsprings ≈£7.3bn · Serco ≈£5.5bn · Mears ≈£2.5bn Originally estimated at £4.5bn; now £15.3bn over ten years. Hotels are ~76% of contract cost but house ~35% of people.
A Parliament-term horizon, not a statutory deadline. Reforms projected to cut asylum costs by ≥£1bn/yr by 2028-29.
Then London (13,687) and the West Midlands (11,969).
Almost all dispersal housing, not hotels. Next: Birmingham (2,142), Liverpool (2,053).
About 0.14% of residents. Highest regions: North East and North West (~25–26 per 10,000).
Top-rate councils cluster in Lancashire, Greater Manchester and the West Midlands, cheaper-housing areas where providers procure accommodation.
Share of London's accommodated asylum seekers in hotels, the highest of any region (vs 21% nationally). Near airports (Hillingdon, Hounslow) it exceeds 85%.
Now hosted in ~89% of local authorities (up from ~25% in 2014) But highly concentrated: about half of councils have fewer than 100 supported asylum seekers, and 18 have none.