In an on-going effort to combat the negative trounce traditional media puts on today’s real estate market, I thought I would pass on some positive info I found in an article today about the market overseas.
The article was about the upside of the declining U.K. real estate market. It seems married couples are staying together as a result falling home prices and the divorce rate in the U.K is dropping. Analysts from the U.K.’s 4th largest real estate firm, Savills, believe that there is a strong connection between falling home prices and the country’s divorce rate.
“As house prices rise, home owners undoubtedly feel wealthier and our supposition is that they also feel able to afford to get divorced,” says Lucian Cook, a Savills researcher. “We forecast that the current falls in property prices will result in fewer divorces, even allowing for the overriding downward trend in the UK’s divorce rate.”
It is not all flowers and candy though. With declining value in the family home couples feel more stressed about finances increasing domestic conflict between couples. The good news is that they are sticking it out.
Lou Lynch – Director of Technology for Prudential Nutshell Realty
Providing stellar Ulster County real estate services for home buyers and sellers in Upstate New York.
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Interesting, but your last paragraph gets to the first thing I thought. Would I rather be miserable being married to someone or miserable being broke? Not a good couple of choices.
Isn’t it unfortunate that people sacrifice their happiness because of their financial (or even perceived financial) situation? Interesting article however!
Kind of reminds me of the song “What’s love got to do with it?”
I had some clients who were discussing thier neighbors messy divorce and how much it cost them to unload properties and divide assets. The wife chimed in with the funniest anecdote, “It’s cheaper to keep her!”
That is crazy. But it does make sense
Hehe, so bring home prices down to almost 0 and the divorce rate will fall really low as well?? I wonder just how related the two trends really are. Good article though.
So this is another twist on the phrase: “It was either a vacation or a divorce, but we can’t afford both.”
This is true I think in the US also, I guess when there’s less money to get your new life started people are much less likely to want to split….
Please look at my comment above, why is my link pointing to a Arizona website
@Mike Pannell –
That comment was left by Mike Oliver from Tucson.
Its so nice to see a US blog looking in this direction so thanks for that.
This article is not about chosing between financial comfort and being miserable. Its about how easy it has become to separate and then divorce in the UK. Theres no stigma, theres family tax credits to top up low incomes, and you could get a 100% mortgage easily. All the kids from divorced parents go on all school trips for free, even foreign trips, so no-one is really made uncomfortable. Til now.
Happy home, savings in the bank, love and marriage. All with a white picket fence, a cat, dog and a boy / girl that share the home. The American and British dream. Interesting concept and connection.
Whatever the reason why the divorce rate is down, whether it be falling home values or not, I guess the good thing is the divorce rate is down.
Here Here BoiseHomes. It’ll save us all a fortune
So the financial crunch of the economy has at last something positive. But one problem still remains, the increased stress level can cause many problems. So why not stay happily when you have no other choice