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Property millionaires double in a decade

The property millionaire

Over the past 10 years the number of British homes worth £1million, or in excess of £1m, has more than doubled, despite slipping back by 19,000 in 2016. We estimate that there are now some 394,000 £1m+ homes across the UK, due in large part to price growth in London and its hinterland.

There are a total of almost 21 million privately owned homes across Britain, out of a total of 25m. Against that context a £1m+ home isn’t exactly run of the mill, but nor is quite the benchmark it was 10 years ago. And where once outside London only a large detached rectory or farmhouse came with such a price tag, it now applies to terraced townhouses in some regional hotspots.

London alone accounts for almost two-thirds of these high value homes, with 250,000. A further 81,400 (20.7 per cent) are located in the South East.

Unsurprisingly, London’s central boroughs have the highest concentration of £1m+ homes. Westminster alone has 36,300, more than all regions except London, the South East and East of England combined. In Kensington & Chelsea almost half of all homes top the £1million mark.

At the other end of the scale, Wales and the North East combined have only 1,100 of these high-value homes, reflecting the wide divide in property values across the UK.

Location of £1m+ properties in London

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Location of £1m+ properties outside London

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Source: Savills Worldwide Research

We are unlikely to witness the same 10-year level of growth over the next decade given the effect of mortgage regulation, the prospect of interest rates rising, and some stagnation over the next couple of years while Brexit is sorted out.

After that we expect to see a bit of rebalancing. Those who have accumulated a lot of housing wealth in London over the past decade will be looking to see where else in the country they can get the more for their money

With this in mid, using EPC data we can now also see clearly how much house £1m will buy in different parts of the country. It shows why those looking to upsize without significantly increasing their budget, are likely move further out.

The smallest £1m homes are found in Kensington & Chelsea, where this seven-figure sum buys just 806 square feet. Across the river that stretches to 1,214 square feet in Wandsworth and 1,659 in Kingston, but buyers need to look east, to Havering, for London’s biggest £1m homes, at an average of almost 2,500 square feet.

Further afield £1m will stretch much further. In Oxford and Cambridge, for example, you get twice as much home for your money as in Kensington & Chelsea. In Bath you would get three times the space, and almost four times as much in the historic towns of Harrogate and Stratford on Avon.

Further information

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