Romania’s central bank to launch nationwide survey on household wealth and consumption

The National Bank of Romania (BNR) has launched a public tender worth RON 6 million to conduct a nationwide statistical survey aimed at assessing household wealth, financing, and consumption patterns, according to procurement documents published in the national electronic procurement system SEAP.

The initiative is part of Romania’s efforts to align with Guideline (EU) 2025/333 issued by the European Central Bank on January 31, which mandates the collection of harmonised statistical data on household wealth, income, and consumption across EU member states. The data is intended to support the development of new wealth distribution indicators and provide a deeper understanding of financial disparities among households.

The research will be implemented in three phases: a preparation stage lasting up to five months for developing the questionnaire, IT platform, and training interviewers; a data collection stage scheduled from March to December 2026; and a post-collection stage of up to 17 months for analysis and validation, Cursdeguvernare.ro reported.

The fieldwork will target a representative sample of 12,000 households nationwide, with an additional reserve pool of 6,200 families. Each interview is expected to last 45 minutes on average but may extend to 90 minutes for middle- or upper-income households.

Survey data will include both objective and subjective information on housing location (e.g. city centre, rural, isolated), the physical characteristics of the dwelling (such as exterior finishes, land area, access to utilities), and a classification of the household’s financial standing, to be assessed directly by the interviewer. Categories include luxury, middle, modest, and very low income.

The BNR plans to use the findings to improve monetary policy analysis and contribute to ECB reporting obligations. The bank will also apply the data to assess financial inclusion, the resilience of households to economic shocks, and the effectiveness of fiscal and social policies.

iulian@romania-insider.com

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