Average London house price hits £500,000 as capital's housing market shows no sign of

**PurpleGorilla** · 28 October 2015, 15:14

Love the BOMAD article at the bottom...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/p...m-and-Dad.html

**BlasterBates** · 28 October 2015, 16:09

Miners and energy companies are busy slashing investments, eventually commodities will start rising, probably in a very steep curve once China recovers, this will cause inflation to pick up, interest rates will go up, and then

KABOOM

I think it would be wise to balance property with investments in mining and energy companies.

**Martin@AS Financial** · 28 October 2015, 17:22

Tony Ward from Clayton Euro Risk recently wrote a piece about London market is pushing up property prices around the rest of the country.

Cut and pasted from the article

"Two recent surveys report that sales of £1m-plus homes in London are falling, while outside the capital these same properties are enjoying a new popularity in certain areas.

Research by Lloyds shows the number of homes worth a million or more in London fell by 15 per cent from 4,357 to 3,703 in the first half of the year compared with the same period in 2014.This is the largest decline since 2009.

LonRes research for the Financial Times also found the number of London homes sold worth £1–£2m fell 22.5 per cent from July–September against the same time last year. This against a backdrop of “historically low” activity in central London, according to estate agent Foxtons.

Some have attributed the slowdown to George Osborne’s stamp duty reforms, which have affected the top end of the market. Buying a £1.5m house will now cost you an extra £18,750 in stamp duty.

Lloyds found that the UK-wide total of £1m-plus property sales fell by 11 per cent in the first half of 2015 compared with the same time last year from 6,303 to 5,599. This contrasts strongly with the 46 per cent increase seen in first half 2014, which suggests the entire country is affected. London, with its higher prices, clearly bears the brunt.

But hold on a moment. Look beyond the national trend and something odd is happening at the local level. Sales of £1m-plus properties may be down, but in leafy Buckinghamshire, the towns of Virginia Water, Cobham and Beaconsfield have been named Britain’s first ‘million-pound towns’.

The average house price in these commuter hubs has hit £1m-plus – the first time this has happened outside London, according to Lloyds. Virginia Water tops the list with an average price of £1.16m. The survey also mentions that the sale of million pound homes in Scotland has more than doubled in the first half of the year. Yorkshire, Humberside and the East of England also saw increases.

Rather than just a reaction to stamp duty changes could there be a real shift in geodemographics under way? It has long been the hope of successive governments that the wealth generated by London will ripple out further and further into the country.

We are also seeing a major upgrade of Britain’s railway network taking place, which will make long distance commuting more palatable for many – particularly when compared with the eye-watering cost of buying a home in the capital.

Granted, Buckinghamshire has always been in the traditional London commuter belt, but with the capital becoming the domain of a financial elite, areas further away from London and the South East may be starting to benefit.

Could the South East be losing its sheen for many? Are we seeing a reduction of ‘hot money’ investing in central London but ‘real investment’ as consumers feel more confident and affluent?

And what is happening in Scotland, Yorkshire and the East of England? This is a trend that begs to monitored closely."

**OwlHoot** · 28 October 2015, 17:59

Originally posted by Martin@AS Financial View Post

Tony Ward from Clayton Euro Risk recently wrote a piece about London market is pushing up property prices around the rest of the country.

Cut and pasted from the article

:::

"Research by Lloyds shows the number of homes worth a million or more in London fell by 15 per cent from 4,357 to 3,703 in the first half of the year compared with the same period in 2014.This is the largest decline since 2009."

:::

What complete and utter worthless hogwash!

There must be literally tens of thousands of homes in London, very likely hundreds of thousands, now worth more than a million, when you consider that any one or more bedroom flat inside the Circle line is almost certainly now worth £1,200,000 or more, and when you think of all the detached houses in places like Wimbledon, Richmond, Dulwich, Hampstead, etc, etc.

I mean try a quick search on Zoopla, in area South Kensington

In the results, the first thing I see is a one-bedroom flat listed only today for £1,310,000. Granted, it hasn't sold yet, but that is not untypical, and two-or-more bedroom flats are typically North of 1.5 million!

**AtW** · 28 October 2015, 18:15

Originally posted by OwlHoot View Post

There must be literally tens of thousands of homes in London, very likely hundreds of thousands, now worth more than a million, when you consider that any one or more bedroom flat inside the Circle line is almost certainly now worth £1,200,000 or more, and when you think of all the detached houses in places like Wimbledon, Richmond, Dulwich, Hampstead, etc, etc.

Most of them are not on sale.

In Birmingham every year only a few houses are sold for £2 mln or more (I think).

**SueEllen** · 28 October 2015, 20:33

Virginia Water isn't in Buckinghamshire.

Plus Surrey is known to be very expensive and has been for years.

Some of the expensive parts have very awarkward commutes by train into central London e.g. the train takes over an hour. In other words the very wealthy people who live in those parts have made their wealth from other things or own more than one property.

**AtW** · 28 October 2015, 21:18

It's good time to start building underground "pod" based starter homes - within walking distance of tube rails...

**CoolCat** · 28 October 2015, 22:07

Deutsche Bank calls the top on London's insane property bubble - Business Insider

**AtW** · 28 October 2015, 22:13

Originally posted by CoolCat View Post

Deutsche Bank calls the top on London's insane property bubble - Business Insider

House prices in UK always go up. Didn't they get the memo?

Average London house price hits £500,000 as capital's housing market shows no sign of