A consideration for many buyers of prime property is often the potential returns from owning that property. Average global prime residential yields have moved in from a high of 3.8% in December 2010, to 2.9% in June 2020, following a decade of capital value growth outpacing rental growth up until 2019, the average yield has held relatively steady since then.

Yields by region

North American cities are the highest yielding region, with an average yield of 4.3% in June 2020, up from a low of 4.0% in June 2017 as rental growth outpaced capital value growth for the first time since 2014. Los Angeles is the highest yielding city in the index, with an average gross yield of 5.6% in June 2020. The rental market here remained resilient in the first half of the year, while prices fell, pushing up the average yield slightly.

Elsewhere in the US, yields in New York stand above Miami and San Francisco. New York has generally seen yields tick upwards since 2017 as oversupply in the market has led to rental values outperforming capital values.

At the other end, cities in Asia Pacific are the lowest yielding out of the cities in our index on average, with an average yield of 2.0% in June 2020 and the bottom ten cities located within this region. Yields here have moved downwards over the past decade as capital value growth has outpaced rental growth, this is particularly true for the cities in China which have seen some of the highest capital value growth over the past decade. Chinese cities in the index yield between 1.5% and 1.7% as of June 2020.

European and Middle Eastern city yields average 3.4% as of June 2020 and have been gradually declining over the past decade. Moscow and Dubai are the highest yielding cities in the region, with an average gross yield of 4.6% as of June 2020. Meanwhile, London and Berlin are the lowest yielding in the region, both with an average gross yield of 2.9%.

_{Read the articles within Savills Prime Index: World Cities below.}