New Home Buyers: The Upsizer

Upsizing may not be as familiar a term as downsizing, but the upsizer is still a major feature of the new build buying market

As a general rule of thumb, upsizers are younger couples with a family – or are thinking of starting one. And this is reflected by their priorities when it comes to buying a home. Upsizers are – of course – looking for more space. And about half of them end up buying a property with four or more bedrooms

Many are moving from London to popular areas outside the capital. Tonbridge & Malling in Kent is one of the favourite places for upsizers. Other popular destinations include Cambridge, Oxford, St Albans and the district of Elmbridge.

Often upsizers are faced with a higher price for the property they are buying, so are more likely to move when the market is slow as it’s more cost-effective. For example, securing a 10% discount on a more expensive property will be worth more in real terms than the 10% you give away to sell. So – if it’s possible – offering some flexibility on price will help secure upsizing sales.    

But upsizing doesn’t necessarily mean spending more money, especially for those moving from London areas with eye-wateringly high property prices. Moving from the capital will often see an upsizer make a saving, even when moving into a larger property - thanks to a favourable disparity in prices.

And with families comes the need for education, so upsizers are likely to be paying very careful attention to the quality of local schools. New homes near grammar schools are particularly coveted, so areas such as Chelmsford in Essex, High Wycombe in Bucks, and Sutton in Surrey, which all have highly rated grammar schools, are popular with upsizers. So, if you do have highly rated schools – both at primary and secondary level - in proximity to your development, then it is certainly worth mentioning this in your marketing.  

Equally, facilities that are important to families are also important to upsizers – so developments with nearby playgrounds, parks, community centres and libraries will be very popular with this buyer type. And upsizers are also usually looking for off-street parking, as the prospect of lugging babies, toddlers and all their paraphernalia half a mile up the road is not an appealing one.  

Being part of a community is also important to them and increasingly they are getting to know their neighbourhood well before moving in. This is a mix of information gathering like crime rates, schooling and transport and social. On the social side tools like facebook groups and nextdoor allow them to start to get a feel for people around their area as well.

As experienced home owners, upsizers, will also look at the cost of running a property. Whilst new builds are more energy efficient, the extra space will mentally equate to extra running cost. Their experience may also drive a lot of interrogation in the buying process and so providing rich detailed information will be particularly more important to this category of buyer than others. By providing information digitally, developers can not only reduce calls and onsite visits, they can help build buyer confidence that all the information that a buyer needs is easily available and at their fingertips.

Sources

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/property/schools/4689322/Property-close-to-grammar-schools-Dont-be-late-for-school.html

https://www.buyassociation.co.uk/2018/04/19/heres-what-buyers-really-want-when-looking-for-a-new-build-home/

https://www.savills.co.uk/research_articles/229130/220215-0

https://www.metro.news/property-hunter-is-now-the-right-time-to-upsize-my-home/1057414/