Household debt in Bulgaria has been growing faster than wealth, according to the annual Allianz Global Wealth Report. By the end of last year the total household debt had reached 31 billion euros, up by 18% on the year.

In recent years, household lending, especially mortgage lending, has registered significant increases. Bulgarians, however, are still much less indebted compared to most of the EU countries. The average debt per capita in Bulgaria is EUR 4 530, while in comparison, it exceeds EUR 10 000 in the Czech Republic, according to Allianz data. In both countries the overall household indebtedness is around one-third of GDP, whereas in many Western European countries the ratio is around and above 100%. The household debt/GDP ratio in the US, for example, is slightly over 70%. On January 1, 2026, Bulgaria will likely enter the euro area with the lowest level of indebtedness, but more and more experts warn that this could change, and lending growth and government spending create risks and add inflation (read more here).

The Allianz Global Wealth Report notes significant changes in household finances and an increase in private debt across 2024 and 2025. Compared to previous years, private debt growth rate has slowed down, while net financial assets of households have increased. Trends in different regions, however, are not uniform despite the decline in key interest rates maintained by central banks.

Last year, global household debt increased by 3.1% to EUR 60 trillions, with its growth rate slowing down. The slowdown is most noticeable in China, where the growth rate declined from nearly 20% in previous periods to 3.4% last year. In the eurozone, credit demand accelerated at an annual growth rate of 1.9% (see the chart).

Households in the four largest economies in the euro area have faced differently reduced interest payments – in Germany and France net interest payments have shrunk significantly. In Germany they were EUR 2.9 bln in June 2025, compared to EUR 3.4 bln euros three years earlier. In France real interest payments have practically stayed unchanged, as noted in the report. However, in Italy and Spain, costs for them have been rising.

According to the Allianz report, Bulgaria is among the countries with significant growth in wealth per capita. Real financial assets in the country have increased 8-fold over the past 20 years, with China ahead of us, and Romania and India slightly behind us. In the US the purchasing power of assets has been growing faster than in Western Europe. As for the distribution of wealth (by the Gini coefficient), Bulgaria shows quite high inequality – the value of the coefficient is 75.1%, with Greece, the Netherlands, and Belgium performing better than us, and Poland and Estonia worse than us.