It remains a fantastic time to move and buy property in Devon and the wider south west as house prices are continuing their unrelenting rise. New figures show the average cost of rising up the property ladder is a huge seventeen percent higher than around 5 years ago. 

The Lloyds Bank Homemovers Review says that the average 'step-up' home in the South West is priced at £256,318. However, a few property hotspots like Salcombe in Devon and Padstow in Cornwall cost much more.
 

Andrew Mason, Lloyds Bank mortgages director, said that the deficit of supply was a primary driver.
 

"Whilst the number of home movers has risen significantly since 2009, it remains well below previous levels and has recovered less strongly than first-time buyer numbers.
 

"This is likely to partly reflect the high costs associated with moving home, as well as highlighting the difficulties that home owners can face in finding somewhere suitable to move to due to the shortage of properties available for sale."
 

Across the United Kingdom, those moving home paid around £50,000 more on average in 2015 to take the next step on the property ladder than they would have done in 2010, the study said.
 

The median price paid for a house during the first half of the year by someone who was already on the property ladder and relocating to their next home was around £260,000, according to the Lloyds Bank Homemovers Review.
 

This was a twenty five percent, or around £50,000, greater amount than the average home mover paid in 2010, when the house they were relocating into had a cost of around £200,000.
 

House movers in the capital are faced with paying forty five percent, or around £150,000, more for a house than they might have done 5 years ago, with houses there now priced at around £500,000.
 

In 2015 the average deposit invested by a house mover was around £90,000, this is 8% or £6,405 greater than in 2014.
 

The typical size of a deposit equals just over a third (thirty four percent) of the average £260,000 cost of a home.

Article by Lyn Barton of the Western Morning News shared by Architects Devon Jonathan Braddick
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