Bungalows - now so rare they make good investments

New research from an over-50’s property company reveals that bungalow construction has dropped to account for just 1.2 per cent of all new-build completions.

Quickmove Properties has looked at the changing rate of bungalow construction between 2000 and 2020, the current market share of bungalows vs all dwelling stock, and the price of new-build bungalows compared to new park homes. 

The latest available data - which applies to 2021 - shows that there are around 1.8m bungalows in England, accounting for 7.6 per cent of the nation’s dwelling stock. What’s more, construction of new-build bungalows is on a steep decline. 

In 2000, bungalows accounted for an estimated 6.9 per cent of all new-build completions. By 2020, however, the completion of just 1,833 new bungalows meant that this market share had dropped to just 1.2 per cent. The average price of a bungalow has risen to £338,769 in England.

Sales Director at Quickmove Properties, Mark O’Dwyer, comment: “You’d be forgiven for thinking that bungalows have simply gone out of fashion and that’s why so few are now being built. But that’s not the case. In reality, demand for bungalows remains high but developers don’t see them as profitable enough to deliver in decent numbers. They can, for example, make much more money by building multi-level dwellings or blocks of flats, so that’s where their focus largely lies.”