Everybody has their own notion of a forever home, whether that is a sprawling mansion, a chic downtown loft or a quaint cottage in the country. However, what would you be willing to pay for that dream residence?
Research conducted by the Nottingham Building Society has shown that homebuyers expect to be purchasing their forever home, that is the property that they will live in for the rest of their lives, when they are around 41 years old. This is despite the statistics showing that the average age of those who have already purchased their final property being 36, displaying a certain level of pessimism amongst those surveyed.
Ben Osgood, senior mortgage manager at The Nottingham, said: “You would naturally assume people always want more so it’s really refreshing to see so many people realising they already live in their forever home.
“A homebuyer’s ‘wish list’ is often created when purchasing their first house but more often than not there’s a degree of compromise required when people are first getting on to the ladder.
“As you travel up the property ladder, taking the next step gets more and more expensive so we’re seeing an increasing number of people asking about additional borrowing so they can remodel and extend to turn their current home into somewhere they have no reason to move from.”
When it comes to that elusive forever home, one of the most important factors is the location of the property with 50% of people who were surveyed by The Nottingham placing this as their key factor. As well as location being central in the search for a forever home, the size of the property (16%), price (13%) and the appearance (8%) all ranked highly amongst those surveyed.