The combination of high house prices, low salaries and a tight lending market mean that many first-time buyers in the Westcountry will be well into their 40s before they can secure their own home, a new report warns.

A survey for the National Housing Federation (NHF) has revealed that an entire generation of young adults are being priced out of the housing market. Mortgage lender demands for big deposits following the banking crisis have compounded the Westcountry's unique combination of high house prices and below- average rates of pay.

The report says single people in the South West will not be handed the keys to their own home until they are 47 years old.

It puts the region second only to London, where would-be homeowners will have to work until they are 52.

David Orr, NHF chief executive, said: "This report highlights how home ownership is becoming a pipe dream, rather than a reality for millions of young people without wealthy parents to support them and demonstrates the scale of the crisis."

More than eight out of ten 18 to 30-year-olds across the country reported that owning their own home was now more of a dream than a reality.

More than a third said they would have to wait more than a decade, while 12 per cent thought it could take up to 20 years. Six per cent believe they will never own their own home.

The research, by consultancy firm Oxford Economics, made forecasts based on how long the average 21-year-old will have to wait until they can afford a 20 per cent deposit and earn enough to qualify for a mortgage.

The picture is slightly better for couples who stay together from the age of 21, save hard and delay having a family – they should be able to afford their own place at 27, the report concluded.

But Councillor Dick Cole, Cornwall's Mebyon Kernow group leader, said the county's lack of social housing, combined with the notoriously low wages and popularity with second-home buyers, was having a "devastating impact" on affordability.

"All the communities in Cornwall are too expensive for people on lower incomes to afford, but the situation is even worse in coastal areas," he said. "People are being pushed away from the areas where they grew up to move to cheaper places.

"The sad thing is that, despite house prices dropping, it is still as difficult as ever to buy a home, because of the reluctancy of banks to lend. The people of Cornwall are paying the price for failure to regulate the banks."

The report comes as worrying figures from property information firm Rightmove indicate that the number of people planning to buy their first home has slumped to the lowest level since records began.

The survey concluded that the shortage of first-time buyers is likely to get even worse, and could have a "devastating" impact on the market.

The poll asked more than 22,000 people whether they planned to buy a property over the next 12 months.

Of those who planned to buy, just 22 per cent were first-time buyers. For a healthy housing market, the figure should be 40 per cent. Only a year ago, it was 31 per cent. Without them, the housing chain comes close to collapse because there is nobody to buy the properties on the bottom of the ladder.

Over the past decade, the number of first-time buyers has collapsed as the house price boom destroyed many people's chance of buying.

Last year, just 199,000 got on to the housing ladder. A decade earlier, there were nearly 600,000, according to the Council of Mortgage Lenders. For most would-be buyers, the explanation is simple – they cannot afford the deposit needed to get the best mortgage deals. Others fear prices will slump.

Meanwhile, Hometrack has recorded that house prices across the country dropped by 0.1 per cent in July.

Richard Copus, Devon spokesman for the National Association of Estate Agents, agreed that the market was more or less static in the Westcountry, and that first-time buyers were in "short supply". He said: "You have got to have new people coming on to the housing market fairly regularly, otherwise it would stagnate, and that would cause a serious problem."

But he said there were signs that banks were beginning to lend again, meaning the situation could eventually ease.