Home movers are spooked by Friday the 13th

Scottish house movers appear to be superstitious about getting the keys to their new home on Friday 13th, Registers of Scotland have claimed.

Half as many people move on Friday 13th as on other Fridays, official figures have shown.

Official figures showed that on the last Friday the 13th in January, 524 properties changed hands, but on the equivalent Friday in 2016, which was the 15th of the month, more than twice as many residential property sales went through at 1,321.

Meanwhile, RoS said that long term data collected from 1 April 2003 to 31 August 2017, an average of 1,163 people moved house on Fridays, with the exception of Fridays which happened to be the 13th day in the month - when only half as many house moves took place.

RoS operations director and accountable officer, Janet Egdell, said: “We can’t definitively say that people are superstitious about moving house on Friday 13th. However, our data does indicate that, while people overwhelmingly prefer to move house on a Friday compared with any other day in the week, there is a significant drop in the number of people doing so where this lands on the 13th day in the month.

“It looks as though Friday 13th is a less popular Friday to move than the others in the year. We look forward to seeing over the next few weeks whether this trend continued in the month of Halloween.”

Rob Moore, author of the finance book 'Money - Make More, Know More, Give More', said that he has known estate agents to remove fees on properties numbered 13.

He said: "People invest in houses or other assets based on superstition. I’ve known people who have avoided completing a property on Friday 13th and who have not bought a house because it was number 13 and deemed to be unlucky.”

The next Friday the 13th is tomorrow.