I don’t know about you but this is a question that used to go through my mind. Granted I was only young at the time and I didn’t really understand much about anything but I knew my parents had a mortgage on their property and I knew that some of my other relatives rented their property but I didn’t understand why.What motivates someone to want to own property in the first place?I have tried to answer this question here. The truth is that there are a myriad of answers to this question and it would be virtually impossible to come up with a reason that covers everyone, but I have attempted to list some of what I see as being the main reasons why people buy property.Yes, that is right – I am not just talking about buying investment property here, I am talking about anyone that buys any property of any kind, so that includes the average person who only ever has a mortgage on one property which is the one they live in.The pressure to keep up with your neighbours can be very strong. Remember when you where in school and you had to have those converse trainers because all the cool kids had them, or perhaps in your school you had to have the latest gameboy to be seen as being cool. Whatever the case was the pressure to keep up with those around you probably started at a very early age.Where do you live:The fact is that whether someone owns their own home or not or whether they feel any kind of compulsion to buy their own home will have a lot to do with where they live. Below are the some of the things that will most likely effect whether someone feels an urge to buy their own home.Don’t underestimate the power of people wanting to “Keep up with the “Joneses”. This can be a very powerful motivator and one that sales people throughout the ages have exploited to good effect.Another reason people buy property is simply because they hate the thought of making someone else rich. They hate giving money each month to a landlord. This mindset is very prevalent in places like England where a man’s home is his castle. How can it be his castle if it is owned by someone else who could at anytime decide to cash it in for a profit?As I write this in May 2016, over the last few years, this mindset might have changed slightly as many people realize that, in the short term at least, property isn’t always profitable.The fact is that many people are actually very happy that they are renting at the moment. When the property market goes through a difficult time and all you can hear on the news is about people being repossessed and having nowhere to live then you the general public become glad of what they see as the relative safety of renting instead of owning property.Having said all that, in the UK at least, the inbuilt programming that many people grow up with, pushing them to buy their own property, is very strong.Now we come to it. This is why you are here. Right?Most people in the UK will never own more than one property at a time during their lifetime; however, for the ambitious few who want to become wealthy, property investment can be seen as the perfect vehicle to do so.It’s a well documented fact that most of the richest people in the World, or in any given country invest in property. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they made their initially wealth from property, but it does mean that they understand the long-term value (or at least they have been told of the long-term value by their financial advisors) of investing in property.Uk property investment or overseas property investment can be very profitable. However, because of the huge sums of money that are involved, it can also be one of the quickest ways to financial ruin.It’s a minefield out there but as long as you keep your wits about you and you invest with your head not your heart and you make sure the figures always stack up, then there is a good chance making money from property could be your road to financial freedom. **Nothing on this website should be confused with financial or legal advice. If you need this, or any other type of advice, please seek the help of a competent professional. In addition, because real estate laws change all the time and differ from state to state, and even city to city in the same state, everything in these pages should be considered general marketing advice and ideas. Please see link to full Disclaimer at the bottom of this page.