More than eight out of ten homeowners work extra hours because they are so worried about paying off their huge mortgages. The long hours are affecting their sleep patterns, eating habits and love lives - and leaving them with no time for hobbies, a survey reveals today.

Soaring house prices - which have doubled in a decade - mean that buyers are taking on enormous debts. Concerns about keeping up with monthly repayments keep 86% of them chained to their desks beyond the hours required in their contracts.

When asked the question: 'Why is job security important to you?', nearly all of them had the same answer. They said that having a mortgage forced them to stay at work for longer in a desperate bid to make sure they do not lose their jobs.

Figures show that the average home loan is now about £120,000. On a typical mortgage deal this would mean monthly repayments of about £740. But hundreds of thousands of homeowners have much bigger debts, particularly those living in London and the South East.

In the capital, the average asking price for a home is now over £300,000, meaning mortgage repayments of more than £1,800. For young people, the situation has reached crisis point, with about 40% of their take-home pay being eaten up by mortgage repayments.

The research, published by Royal Bank of Scotland's The One account, found that worries about money are having a profound effect on people's lives.

Working such long hours means that half of the 871 homeowners interviewed did not have any spare time for leisure. Nearly 45% said that the long hours affected their love life.

Others said that overtime cut back the amount of sleep they managed to get, and meant they ate less healthy food and spent less time keeping fit. Debbie Milsom, from The One account, said: ' Homeowners are finding the work-life balance increasingly difficult to deal with.

"People are so busy focusing on job security that they don't have time to look after themselves, or even maintain an active life outside work.' Britons work longer hours than anybody else in Europe, typically staying in the office for nearly nine hours every day. Despite their 'desk junkie' lifestyles, the country's workers still manage to be among the least productive in Europe.

A typical full-time worker spends 42½ hours a week in the office, more than two hours longer than the European average.

Other surveys have shown that Britons are addicted to their jobs for reasons which range from loving their work to a permanent paranoia about being sacked. Others feel they have to work long hours because of a culture of 'presenteeism'.

 

Copyright © 2005 First Mortgage Trust