Dreams of homeownership remain high

A poll of more than 8000 adults, conducted by YouGov, suggested that 79% of adults would like to be home owners in 10 years’ time which is a slight drop from 81% a year ago.

In its newsletter, the Council of Mortgage Lenders, said that despite the slight drop it would characterise the desire to own a home as “resilient” when viewed against the backdrop of protracted economic difficulties.

It said: “All age groups continue to show a strong preference for home ownership in the longer term but there has been an appreciable drop amongst younger age groups over the past few years. By contrast those of retirement age appear to value home ownership more highly than ever before.”

The findings showed that when it comes to people’s views on preferred tenure these seem to depend on the type of tenure that people already have.

The majority of private sector tenants, 64%, and those sharing with parents, other relatives or friends, 70%, aspire to become home owners in the longer term although both percentages are lower than a year ago, at 76% and 78% respectively.

The CML asked respondents whether they would ideally like to buy a new home in the next two to three years, with 44% saying they would.

Those renting privately or sharing with parents, other relatives or friends, and 25-34 year olds showed the strongest appetite to buy.

When asked whether they actually expected to be in a position to buy a new home within the next two to three years, a little over a third (36%) of the 44% who would ideally like to move think that it is likely that they will do so.

The CML said: “This means that about 16% of all respondents would like to buy during the next two to three years and believe that it is likely to happen, 6% see it as very likely to happen and 10% as fairly likely.”

Respondents selected a wide range of factors that they consider are currently making it more difficult to buy a home. These include the wider economic situation, incomes and living standards as well as limited suitable properties being offered for sale and high transaction costs.

Mortgage-related factors are specifically cited by a minority of respondents but they appear to rank some way below other factors.

The CML said: “It is feasible though that a perceived limited availability of low-deposit mortgages would be a counterpart to insufficient savings and high house prices.”

Peter Lawrence at Lawrence Rand said: “The underlying culture of home ownership in the UK is clearly alive and well and any talk of its demise is clearly inaccurate.”