FTBs making smart sacrifices

A survey of homeowners has highlighted the savvy behaviours of today’s first-time buyers (FTBs).

The report found that over half of FTBs are opting to buy a studio flat or a home with one or two bedrooms. Also, 67% said they purchased a property in an area they were unfamiliar with due to affordability challenges and a lack of suitable properties. But one in four new homeowners are moving on after an average of four and a half years, with 37% of respondents saying this was due to space sacrifices and 18% citing location as a key factor.

David Morris at Santander commented that “the new wave of more savvy first-time owners seems to be increasingly pragmatic”; they are making compromises to get on the property ladder, then moving on to somewhere “better suited to their long-term needs”.

Sources:

First-time buyers’ sacrifice on space drives them up property ladder in fewer than five years