Number of people planning to move home has doubled over the last 12 months

"New Year is traditionally a time for planning and looking ahead, and moving home is again becoming a priority for many people"

The housing market varies greatly across the country (PA)

At the start of 2013, 7 per cent of those surveyed by Clydesdale and Yorkshire Banks said that they planned to move to a new home within the next 12 months, a figure that now stands at 14 per cent.

The largest percentage of those planning to move are in the London area where 18 per cent aim to buy a new home in 2014, followed by 17 per cent in both Wales and the Midlands.

There is also a strong belief that the value of homes will increase in 2014 with only three per cent predicting that the value of their home will drop in the next 12 months compared to 48 per cent who think it will go up.

"New Year is traditionally a time for planning and looking ahead, and moving home is again becoming a priority for many people," said Andrew Pearce, Retail Director for Clydesdale and Yorkshire Banks."

A similar 'sentiment' index from Knight Frank/Markit House in December 2013 showed that more than 24 per cent of the 1,500 homeowners surveyed across the UK said that the value of their home had gone up over the previous month.

Gráinne Gilmore, head of UK residential research at Knight Frank, said: "Expectations that house prices will rise over the next year are becoming more entrenched across the country. Households in the South East and the East of England now expect the value of their properties to increase at a sharper rate than households in London. This in some part reflects the “doughnut” effect that we are seeing in prices outside the central London market, with some regions now starting to see the most significant growth in residential property values since before the financial crisis."

A survey by Zooopla last autumn showed that on average, homeowners predicted that property prices would rise by nearly six per cent this year, and more than eight per cent in London.