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By Nicole Peters

Second homes aren’t just for the wealthy. Even more, not all people with financial wealth buy a second home to showcase their financial level. Opportunity to spend time in a location that they love without incurring hotel costs and the chance to offer their adult children and other family members a place to visit or vacation are reasons why some people with wealth invest in a second home.

Protective and travel reasons to invest in a second home

Here are more reasons why people buy second homes. Each reason comes with a benefit that you might not realize unless you’re in a natural disaster like a flood, hurricane, earthquake or tornado:

• Vacation home in an entirely different region than you live in – In addition to buying a second home in the United States, you could invest in a second home that’s located in another country.
• Equity – A second home could help you to build even more equity. Find someone to lease the property you and a second home could pay for itself.
• Business space – As an entrepreneur, you could use a second house as the location where employees who support your business work. Types of businesses that this could be a good fit for include graphic design, interior design, restaurant, barber shop, beauty salon and marketing.
• College residence – The second house that you buy could end up being the off-campus residence for a niece, nephew or your adult child. On an annual basis, it could be a less expensive option than paying for on-campus housing.
• Relocation – Companies might cover some or all of your relocation expenses if it was senior management who asked you to relocate. Should you relocate on your own, you might be responsible for picking up all relocation expenses. An existing second home in a relocation area could save you hundreds of thousands in relocation costs.

Second homes can protect entire families

A second home could become your primary residence if you relocate. Should your first home suffer irreparable damage, your second home might also serve as a much welcomed protection from hard natural elements like floods, falling rocks, mud slides and damaging high winds.

This protection is realized if you buy a second home in a location that’s far from your primary residence. But, it’s not just property that you could receive this way. When you own a house that’s 100 or more miles away from your primary residence, you could move to an area where gasoline, utility and other costs aren’t skyrocketing as a way to deal with a devastating storm.


You don’t have to invest top dollar in a second home. A small, low price one bedroom house that’s no more than 1,000 square feet could serve as a great second home for one to three people. In the event that the house does become your primary residence, you could add one or more rooms onto the house.