Improvement, not relocation, favoured by over 30s


by Andrew Regan - Date: 2007-10-21 - Word Count: 409 Share This!


Moving house is not a priority for most homeowners who are in their thirties and forties, but transforming their property into something better is top of the list, according to recent research by Standard Life. Content to stay put having reached middle age, the 30 and 40-somethings now concentrate their efforts into improving their home, rather than embark on all the trials and tribulations of buying a new one.



Indeed, almost three quarters of those surveyed said the escalating cost added to the sheer disruption of moving would add as a deterrent, whilst three out of five wished to remain in familiar surroundings. The underlying agenda for one in three of those surveyed is to improve their home in order to increase its value, whereas the remainder just want to spruce up their house and make it a nicer place in which to live.



In order to realise their improvement dreams many homeowners use either secured loans or remortgages as the prime source of the funds. Both offer lower interest rates than unsecured lending, and are secured against the property being improved. Despite successive interest rate rises and the uncertainty around the Northern Rock jitters, the Council of Mortgage Lending has indicated that remortgage demand is remaining steady. For the majority of homeowners in their 30s and 40s who've been in their home for 10 -15 years getting a remortgage wouldn't pose a problem, as they should have a substantial amount of equity in their property due to the boom in house prices over the period.



During July 2007 almost nine out of ten mortgage advances in the UK were remortgages, as homeowners on nearly expired fixed rate mortgages looked to switch to a new deal rather than convert to the standard variable rate, which has increased five times in the past year. But, amongst those taking out remortgages is a significant amount looking to add a conservatory, a loft conversion, or even perhaps a new room in an effort to make their homes more valuable as well as more liveable. Indeed, almost one in ten said they had added at least one room to their original property in order to accommodate their growing family.



The Standard Life research also revealed that the average Briton travels a total of 125 miles throughout their lifetime between house moves, which may be why the over-30s are quite happy to stay-put once they find a home they love in a location they enjoy.


Related Tags: remortgages, fixed rate, variable rate, moving house, uk remortgages

Your Article Search Directory : Find in Articles

© The article above is copyrighted by it's author. You're allowed to distribute this work according to the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs license.
 

Recent articles in this category:



Most viewed articles in this category: