How your neighbours can save you money
Vicky Shaw
Can’t put a price on good neighbours? Actually, you can. - Credit: Press Association Images
Good neighbours can save you an average of £165 per year, new research has revealed.
From lending a lawnmower to looking after pets, the benefits of having a good relationship with your neighbours can really add up.
In a survey of over 4,000 people, Halifax found that the most common money-saving deeds performed by kind neighbours include collecting groceries (12 per cent), watering plants (10 per cent) and looking after pets (8 per cent).
People typically receive some form of help from their neighbours three times a month, the bank’s ‘Community Counts’ report found.
On average, those who are getting neighbourly help receive 10 hours of support a month, with this increasing to 12 hours since the start of the pandemic.
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The most time-consuming favour that people do for their neighbours is helping out with DIY, which typically takes 42 minutes.
The highest cash savings were found to come from neighbours looking after kids (a saving of £313 per year on average), helping out with cleaning (£276) and pet-sitting (£248).
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Saving money on taxis and public transport also featured, with nearly one in eight (12 per cent) of people surveyed having had a lift from a neighbour.
There are also benefits of convenience, as well as cash savings.
More than half (52 per cent) say their neighbours have taken in parcels for them when they’ve not been there to open the door, and more than a quarter (27 per cent) have had help with taking their bins out.
The types of tasks neighbours help out with have changed since the pandemic started, however. Halifax found people are now more likely to get help with picking up shopping, but less likely to need a hand with watering plants, as more people have been staying at home – so can take care of such tasks themselves.
It’s likely that neighbours will increasingly help each other out in the future too.
A quarter (25 per cent) of people surveyed said their relationship with their neighbours had improved since the COVID-19 crisis started, while only 3 per cent said it had deteriorated.
A third (32 per cent) said they would have found it harder to cope during the pandemic without their neighbours.
