The Household Financial Comfort Report asked 1500 people to rate their household comfort for the first half of 2018, showing short-term cash savings to be the biggest area of decline.

Living expenses were cited as the biggest reason for having to use short-term savings, the survey, compiled by super-fund owned bank ME, found.

In the past year, 17 per cent of households could not always pay their utilities bills on time, 19 per cent sought financial help from family or friends and 15 per cent pawned or sold something to buy necessities, the findings showed.

"Australians generally can dip into their savings to get by," consulting economist for ME Jeff Oughton said.

"However some households may get to a point where there's no more savings to draw from.

"Currently, around a quarter of Australian households have less than $1000 in cash savings."

The report said the worst-affected demographic was young singles and couples under 30 with no kids.

This group reported falls across all areas of comfort, including in their ability to handle a financial emergency.

Meanwhile, 'baby boomers' continued to report the highest financial comfort of all generations.

Australian Associated Press