Single women impact the first-home market

As Bridget Jones - the nineties icon of singletons the world over - takes to our screens for a second time over the coming weeks, Halifax research shows that young women are increasingly choosing to buy their first home alone.

The proportion of mortgages taken out by single women has risen from 9.8 per cent in 1983 to 23.1 per cent last year, said the Halifax, and the phenomenon is leading many estate agents to change the way they market their properties.

Although women over 21 gained the right to vote in 1928, as late as the 1970s working women were refused mortgages in their own right because few were employed continuously. They were granted mortgages only if they could secure the signature of a male guarantor.

Craig Donaldson, head of mortgage products at Halifax, said: "Women's role in society has changed immensely since the early 1900s, and it wasn't until the Sixties and Seventies that women really became a force in the housing market.

"Research shows that women are typically more independent than men, leaving home at an earlier age and, increasingly, buying their first homes alone."

The number of single-person households has soared from around 17% to around 31% over the last 30 years.


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