The Seven-Year Real Estate Itch

By Ryan Dosen

 

George Axelrod wrote a play that later became a famous Marilyn Monroe movie called “The Seven Year Itch.” The title and phrase were used to indicate the inclination to become unfaithful to one’s spouse after seven years of marriage.

According to Wikipedia and Kiernan’s “Cohabitation in Western Europe” (1999), “statistics show that there is a low risk of separation during the first months of marriage. After the ‘honeymoon’ months, divorce rates start to increase. Most married couples experience a gradual decline in the quality of their marriage; in recent years around the fourth year of marriage. Around the seventh year, tensions rise to a point that couples either divorce or adapt to their partner.”

If humans, in general, tire of their spouses after about seven years, how long does it to take them to tire of their residences and move elsewhere?

 

How Often Do People Move?

If you guessed that people leave their homes at about the same rate that they leave their significant others, you’d actually be correct. Right on pace with the seven-year relationship itch, the latest data from Keller Williams Real Estate tells us that people move an average of once every seven years.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the United States is considered “highly mobile.” The latest Census numbers available also reveal that 12 percent of the population moved between 2011 and 2012. These numbers are some of the lowest ever reported for this country (dating back to 1948, when the data was first collected). The low number, from 2011, was an 11.6 percent move rate. The high number, from 1951, was around 22 percent. With the exception of a brief spike in the mid-to-late ’80s, the American move rate has generally trended down since the ’50s.

 

Why Do People Move?

People move for many reasons. In our experience, the most common reason for people making a move is that the size of their home no longer properly suits their needs. People that are young and starting or expanding a family need bigger homes. People that are retiring or have children moving out often need to downsize.

Of course, not everyone has to worry about moving a family, and those with a family may decide to move for other reasons. Job transfers, significant changes in income, health issues, proximity-to-family issues, marriage/divorce, and lifestyle changes are just some of the many reasons why a person or family might decide to move.

And then there’s the itch. Like our personal relationships, we simply may be predisposed to grow tired of our homes after about seven years.

 

Remember To Water Your Lawn

This whole “seven year itch” thing, to me, is both fascinating and unsettling. Whether referring to relationships or real estate, “the itch” seems to play off the basic human tendency to want what we don’t have and to see greener grass on the other side of the fence.

You probably agree that it’s not right to look to trade in significant others every seven years. I think that most people would agree in principle that when it comes to relationships, if you don’t like the color of the grass, you should remember to water and care for it before you complain about the way it looks.

Trading houses, fortunately, should be less problematic than trading spouses. If it’s been seven years and you have to scratch an itch, buy a new house and do your best to appreciate the important people that will live therein.

 

– Ryan Dosen manages The Wayne Megill Real Estate Team of Keller Williams Brandywine Valley in West Chester, PA. For buyer or seller representation, or for more perspective on the local and national real estate market, please email rdosen@megillhomes.com and visit The Wayne Megill Team blog at http://www.PAHomesAndRealEstate.com.