Council of Mortgage Lender figures show that some 680,000 homeowners who have a mortgage, upped sticks and moved in the last two years. The most common reasons being the desire to get higher up the ‘housing ladder' (1 in 3 movers) and the need for more room (cited by 1 in 5 home movers).
Almost 217,000 people were motivated to move in order to climb up the property ladder, 102,000 to downsize and 108,000 because they had found their dream home.
But not everyone could cite such positive reasons for moving. Indeed over 40,800 people were motivated to move in order to get into their preferred school's catchment area. Redundancy and financial difficulties pushed 6800 into selling up and moving to a cheaper abode.
Abbey Mortgages' survey also found that seven per cent of all homeowners are actively looking to move, more than a third of these people said they were being motivated by necessity rather than choice.
Reasons cited for moving - Number
Desire to simply get 'higher up the housing ladder' - 217600
We needed more room - 136000
The dream house came onto the market - 108800
We couldn't stand the neighbours/neighbourhood in which we lived - 95200
We wanted somewhere smaller - more manageable - 102000
A new job meant we needed to relocate - 74800
We wanted to move into a better school catchment - 40800
Bereavement - 13600
I needed to move because of the end of a relationship - 13600
Redundancy or financial difficulties - 6800
Nici Audhlam-Gardiner, Director of Abbey Mortgages, commented: "The saying "love thy neighbour" seems long forgotten as so many of us plan to move each year just to get away from those next door.
"Despite this, people are still moving for positive reasons such as the desire to move up the property ladder or as a result of their dream home coming on to the market. We have seen a fifty per cent increase in the number of people applying for mortgages to buy a new home in recent months compared to the average monthly applications for purchase mortgages for the first half of the year.
"To help those looking to move, we have some excellent tracker deals starting at 2.69 per cent and fixed rate deals available from 3.78 per cent. There is also a 90 per cent LTV first time buyer specials at 5.99 per cent with a £495 fee and lower rates and fee- free deals for our existing current account customers starting from 3.89 per cent for a 2-year fix 75 per cent LTV and a 3-year tracker at 2.99 per cent and 75 per cent LTV."
