Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-09-30

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

In some countries owning a home rather than renting one is very important for people. Why might this be the case? Do you think this is a positive or negative situation?

Student answer (Band 5.5)

In some countries, owning a home is considered much more important than renting one. This is mainly because home ownership is with financial security, social status and long term stability. Although this view has many advantages, it can also create financial and social problems.

Firstly, owning a property provides a sense of security because peoples do not have to worry about increasing rents or asked to leave. Additionally, a house can be consider a long-term investment. If property prices increase, homeowners may benefit financially in the future. Owning a home is also a sign of success and independence.

This situation has some clear advantages. For families, owning a home can provide greater control over their living environment and may less housing cost.

However, there are disadvantages as well.In places where home ownership is strongly valued, people may feel pressur to purchase property even when they cannot easily afford it. This can result in large debts and financial stress. So thats reason financial stress increased day by day. Furthermore, high demand for property may part to rising house prices, making it increasingly difficult for lower income people to buy a home.

In conclusion, for my prespective, owning a home is largely for security, financial investment and social status. While home ownership can provide long-term stability and financial benefit, excesive pressure to own property can lead to debt and make housing less affordable. Therefore, both owning and renting can have advantages depending on an intergenerational living financial circumstances.

AI examiner evaluation

CriterionBand
Task Achievement / Task Response5.5
Coherence and Cohesion5.5
Lexical Resource5.5
Grammatical Range and Accuracy5.5
Overall5.5

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

The response addresses all parts of the prompt by discussing why owning a home is important and whether this is a positive or negative situation. A clear position is maintained throughout the essay. However, there are a few under-developed ideas, and the length requirement was unfortunately not met, falling just 4 words short of the 250-word minimum at 246 words. This slight penalty prevents the essay from reaching a higher band. Ideas like financial security, social status, and debt are introduced but could have been extended with greater elaboration. Despite this, the main tenets of the task are adequately covered.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The essay displays a coherent overall arrangement with a logical progression of ideas. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate introduction, reasons, advantages, disadvantages, and conclusion. Cohesive devices are employed, such as 'Firstly', 'Additionally', and 'However', though some transitions feel slightly mechanical or repetitive, such as 'This situation has some clear advantages.' Referencing is generally clear, but occasional awkward phrasing in transitions, like 'So thats reason financial stress increased day by day', disrupts the flow. Overall, the organizational structure is easy to follow.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully attempting less common items such as 'financial security', 'long-term investment', and 'intergenerational living'. However, there are noticeable word choice and collocation errors, such as 'home ownership is with financial security' (missing preposition/verb), 'peoples do not have to worry' (grammatical error in plural), 'can be consider' (missing suffix), 'feel pressur to purchase' (spelling and form error), and 'excesive pressure' (spelling error). These lexical inaccuracies do not seriously impede communication but prevent the score from reaching a higher band.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, demonstrating some variety. However, there are frequent grammatical errors and awkward structures throughout the text, including 'peoples do not have to worry about increasing rents or asked to leave', 'may less housing cost', 'So thats reason financial stress increased day by day', and 'is largely for security'. Punctuation is also occasionally faulty, as seen in the missing space after the period in 'disadvantages as well.In places'. While these errors do not completely obscure the writer's meaning, they occur regularly and limit the grammatical score.

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