New research by a UK home insurance company has revealed that Britain is now a nation of online property snoops, thanks to the ease of looking up property on the internet.
According to the research, 63 percent of Brits admit to searching property websites and looking at homes they have no intention of buying, and a massive 2.6 million property-obsessed Brits do it at least one a day!
Danny Luke, Managing Director of Quick Move Now, commented: “I think we’ve all known for quite a while that the Brits are obsessed with property. We love owning property, developing property and decorating property, but most of all we like to make a good return on our property investment, and I think that’s where the motivation for a lot of this online ‘snooping’ is coming from. We want to know what’s on the market and how it compares to our property, we want to know how much our neighbours paid for their house in comparison to how much we paid for ours, and we want to have a good old snoop around other properties, dreaming of what we might buy if budget were no object, and looking for inspiration for our own homes.”
Danny may well be right, as the research also found that 38 percent of all Brits have used the internet to check the price of someone else’s home online in the last year. These included neighbour’s homes – which accounted for 52 percent of property snoopers, a family member – which accounted for 38 percent, close friends – which accounted for 31 percent and even colleagues – which accounted for 21 percent. Ex-lovers and potential new partners also featured in the ‘snooped on’ list.
It seems around 60 percent of snoopers claim they are doing so to keep an eye on local property prices, whilst the remaining 40 percent say they are researching areas where they might potentially live in the future, daydreaming about homes they can’t afford and looking for interior design inspiration.
Danny adds: “The prevalence of online property portals makes property accessible in a way we’ve never seen before. Previously, you’d have had to look in an estate agent’s window, or even make an enquiry with them, which feels quite ‘high commitment’ in comparison to just clicking onto a website and being greeted with every available property within a specified area. You have access to a huge collection of photos, floorplans and property details at the click of a button, while remaining totally anonymous, with no estate agents chasing you as a consequence. Although respondents in the research say they have no intention of moving, we have heard several stories of people who weren’t intending to move when they started looking at property online, but then saw a home that they fell in love with, so although most will not go on to buy a property, your home might just catch the eye of a chance buyer if it’s presented well enough online.”
