New world view of location, location, location

Conor Power talks to expert auctioneers about how the market for house buyers has changed significantly in the past year

Property is still cheaper in the more rural locations and if there’s broadband in the area, the homeowner can work from home five days a week.

One of the effects of the pandemic was for people to re-think the idea of location. Traditionally speaking, location has been a vital element when looking for a home. The pandemic forced companies to set up remote working for their employees and, now that many of them have discovered that it can work perfectly well (though not in all industries, obviously), location has become a much more fluid phenomenon.

This is marked change in direction from the years immediately after the downturn of 2008-11, when people were deserting the quieter outlying areas in favour of more central locations in city and town centres or in areas that were convenient to their workplace.