Quantcast
Menu

First-time Buyers

Revealed: The town with the youngest first-time buyers

Christina Hoghton
Written By:
Christina Hoghton
Posted:
Updated:
30/09/2016

The national average age of a first-time buyer is 30, but the youngest first-time buyers are just 27 in Carlisle in Cumbria and Torfaen in south Wales, according to Halifax.

The oldest average first-time buyer is aged 34 in areas including Slough in Berkshire and the London boroughs of Barnet and Ealing. The lender noted a seven-year age gap across the UK among those coming onto the housing ladder for the first time.

Your first time

Other places where the average age of a first-time buyer is significantly below the national average are Redditch in the West Midlands and Newark and Sherwood in the East Midlands, at 28 years old. First-time buyers have a low average age of 28 in three areas in Yorkshire – Doncaster, Barnsley and Calderdale.

The youngest first-time buyers in southern England are in Waveney in Suffolk and Broadland in Norfolk with an average age of 28 in both areas. Portsmouth and neighbouring Gosport have the youngest first-time buyers in the South East, at 29. The youngest first-time buyers in the capital are in Lambeth with an average age of 30 years old.

Unsurprisingly, there’s a strong relationship between areas with low average house prices with the youngest first-time buyers. All 10 areas with the youngest first-time buyers have prices below the national average of £200,754. Seven of these 10 have an average house price of between three quarters and half the national average.

Chris Gowland, mortgages director at Halifax, said: “The majority of areas in the country where the average age of first-time buyers is two to three years below the national average of 30 are outside southern England, mostly locations where house prices are typically lower both in monetary terms and in relation to earnings, factors that help to reduce the size of the deposit needed.”

The top 10 areas with the oldest first-time buyers are all in the south east of England. Nine of these – including the London boroughs of Barnet, Ealing, Richmond and Hounslow – all have an average age of 34, the highest in the country.
 
Richmond upon Thames, Brent, Barnet and Ealing all have an average price of more than double the national average.