26.4% Of Basingstoke Homes Are One Person Households
I was having an interesting chat with a
Basingstoke Buy to Let landlord the other day when the subject of the size of
households came up in conversation. One
of the reasons that I believe the Basingstoke property market will, in the
medium to long term, be OK, was the fact that the size of households in the 21st
Century is getting smaller – which will create demand for Basingstoke Property
and therefore keep property prices from dropping.
Looking at the stats going back to the early
1960’s, when the average number of people in a home was exactly 3, it has
steadily over the years dropped by a fifth to today’s figure of 2.4 people per
household. That doesn’t sound a lot, but if the population remained at the same
level for the next 50 years and we again had the same 20% drop in household
size, the UK would need to build an additional 5.28 million properties (or 105,769
per year). When you consider the Country is only building 139,800 properties a
year ... it doesn’t leave much for people living longer and immigration.
Looking closer to home...
In the Basingstoke and Deane
Borough Council area, the average
number of occupants per
household is 2.4 people
When we look at the current picture
nationally and split it down into tenure types (i.e. owned, council houses and
private renting), a fascinating picture appears.
The vast majority of home that don’t have a
mortgage are occupied by one or two people (81% in fact), although this can be
explained as residents being older, with some members of
the family having moved out, or a pensioner living alone. People living on their own are more likely to
live in a Council house (43%) and the largest households (those with 4 or more
people living in them are homeowners with a mortgage – but again, this can be
explained as homeowners with families tending to need a mortgage to buy. What
surprised me was the even spread of private rented households and how that
sector of the population is so evenly spread across the occupant range – in
fact that sector is the closest to the national average, even though they only
represent a sixth of the population.
When we look at the Basingstoke and
Deane Borough Council figures for all tenures (Owned, Council and Private
Rented), a slightly different picture appears...
1 person households in Basingstoke
|
2 person households in Basingstoke
|
3 person households in Basingstoke
|
4 person households in Basingstoke
|
5+ person households in Basingstoke
|
26.40%
|
36.37%
|
16.46%
|
14.50%
|
6.28%
|
·
27.7% of Private Rental
Properties are 1 person Households
·
36.4% of Private Rental
Properties are 2 person Households
·
18.5% of Private Rental
Properties are 3 person Households
·
11.0% of Private Rental
Properties are 4 person Households
·
6.1% of Private Rental
Properties are 5+ person Households
As you can see, Basingstoke is not too dissimilar from the national
picture but there is story to tell. If you are considering future buy to let
purchases in the coming 12 to 18 months, I would seriously consider looking at 1
and 2 bed houses or apartments. Even with the numbers stated, there are simply
not enough 1 and 2 bed houses or apartments to meet the demand. They have to be
in the right part of Basingstoke and priced realistically, but they will always
let and when you need to sell, irrespective of market conditions at the time,
will always be the target of buyers.
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