Research show first-time homebuyers favouring cities

July 12, 2025 by Brendan O'Neill

News

Property Market

Surveys and Statistics

There has been a rise in the number of people looking to buy for the first time who are choosing to search for properties in cities, according to the latest piece of research to be published.

This research comes from the property website Rightmove and it makes a comparison between data from now and 10 years ago. What this shows is that there has been a 16% rise in the number of people hoping to buy a first home who favour a city location.

On the other hand, when it comes to coastal locations, the level of demand has stayed the same.

The actual cities that are experiencing the highest demand may come as some surprise though. At the top of the list is Dundee, where demand among first-time buyers has risen by 176% during the past 10 years. The city that comes in second is another Scottish one – Edinburgh. Here, there has been a rise of 91% in demand.

Doncaster is the city in third place, having experienced a 74% rise in first-time buyer enquiries throughout the last decade. One UK city where demand has fallen instead of rising is London, which has witnessed a drop of 7%. Rightmove is arguing that this is down to the cost of housing in the city.

Property expert Colleen Babcock said that cities were only growing in appeal to those looking to buy for the first time. She pointed out that there was considerable variance though.

This is something that those with CeMAP training must bear in mind when conducting property searches.