In 2011 RIBA (Royal institute of British architects) conducted a survey of home buyers the results confirm consumer dissatisfaction with new build housing and highlight the lack of space as their biggest concern. Some of their key findings are listed below. New Leaf Custom Build would like to end this dissatisfaction and provide plots or homes that exceed rather than fail to meet consumer expectations. 

• 60% of people who would not buy a new home said that the small size of the rooms was the most important reason for them
• The top three things people look for when moving home are outside space (49%), the size of the rooms (42%), and proximity to local services (42%).
• 31% of people would not consider buying a home built in the last ten years, or would only consider it as a last resort. Of these, 60% said it was because the rooms are too small, 46% said they lack style, and 45% were concerned about the lack of outside space.
• People believe that newly built homes fail to provide two of the top three things they are looking for when moving home: adequate space inside and outside the home. People couldn’t fit all their furniture into their homes, nor move their furniture around or try different layouts:
• 47% (58% of fully occupied homes) said there was not enough space for furniture they owned or would like to own
• 51% (65% of fully occupied homes) said the amount of space in their homes limited the choice of furniture layout in rooms and 36% in fully occupied homes said they had difficulty moving furniture around because of limited space in corridors and stairways People didn’t have enough storage for their possessions
• 57% (69% of fully occupied homes) said there was not enough storage for their possessions
• 35% said that they didn’t have enough kitchen space for the appliances like toasters or microwaves, and 43% of respondents in fully occupied homes said they didn’t have enough space for convenient food preparation
• People didn’t have enough space to socialise, entertain guests, or spend quiet time in private
• 34% of fully occupied households said they didn’t have enough space to have friends over for dinner, and 48% didn’t have enough space to entertain visitors at all.
• 28% of all respondents (48% of fully occupied homes) felt that they couldn’t get away from other people’s noisy activities

New homes appear to be getting smaller:

• The average home in the UK was 85m² and has 5.2 rooms, with an average area of 16.3m² per room.
• In comparison the average new home in the UK was 76m² and had 4.8 rooms, with an Average area of 15.8m² per room.

This suggests that the size of new homes in the UK – the floor area, number of rooms and size of those rooms – has shrunk

New homes in the UK are the smallest in Western Europe. By way of compassion:

• In Ireland, new homes were 87.7m² (15% bigger)
• In the Netherlands, new homes were 115.5 m² (53% bigger)
• In Denmark, new homes were 137m² (80% bigger).