Surreal real estate prices: The 2011 Property Rich List
1st June 2011
- Kensington most expensive place to live with avg. house prices near £1.75m
- Britain now home to 220,131 Property Millionaires, slightly down from last year
- 5,922 Million Pound Streets in Britain, with average house prices of over £1m
- Average UK homeowner could barely afford a 175 sq ft bedsit in Kensington
- Surrey home to highest number of Property Millionaires outside the capital
Britain's Property Rich List 2011, released today by leading property website Zoopla.co.uk, reveals Kensington, London W8, to be by far the most expensive neighbourhood in the country to live, with average house prices there standing at almost £1.75 million.
Britain is now home to 220,131 Property Millionaires, down from 223,119 this time last year, and has 5,922 Million Pound Streets, where average house prices are over £1 million. London tops the list of places with the most Million Pound Streets by far with 2,290, followed by commuter hotspot Guildford with 89 and footballer’s paradise, Cobham, in third place with 78.
The average home in Kensington now costs £1,737,862 according to the study by Zoopla.co.uk, which provides free online value estimates for every home in the UK. And whilst this is £400,000 more than its nearest rival Chelsea, SW3 where the average pad will set you back £1.32m, all of the top five neighbourhoods on the list boast average property prices of over £1m and includes Knightsbridge, SW7 (£1.31m), Notting Hill, W11 (£1.17m) and West Brompton, SW10 (£1.05m).
The top 10 most expensive neighbourhoods in the country are almost entirely in the capital, with the only exception being seventh placed Virginia Water, Surrey GU25, home to exclusive Wentworth Golf Club, where average house prices are £936,653. And nine out of the top 10 on the list have seen average house prices fall over the past 12 months, with the only exception being Hampstead, London NW3.
Topping the list of the most expensive streets in Britain once again is Kensington Palace Gardens, W8 – also known as Billionaires Row - where the average property price is a staggering £19.2 million. This exclusive gated street is home to Saudi and Brunei royalty, Russian oligarchs and Britain's richest man, Lakshmi Mittal, who owns not one but three properties on the street.
But the eye-watering house prices in Britain’s most expensive neighbourhoods reflect a premium for their location, not necessarily the space they offer. With the average cost per square foot in Kensington now at £1,193 and the average UK house price at £205,985, a move to W8 might provide a fancy address but would only get the average homeowner 173 square feet, barely enough room to swing a cat.
The most expensive area to live in Britain is Windsor & Maidenhead where average house prices stand at £389,120, just ahead of the average in London (£387,119). Rounding out the top 5 most expensive areas are Surrey (£371,984), Hertfordshire (£300,914) and Oxfordshire (£284,402). Whilst more than half of the Property Millionaires in Britain reside in London, outside the capital the county with the highest number of Property Millionaires by far is Surrey with over 15,000 currently.
Nicholas Leeming of Zoopla.co.uk, commented:"Despite the recent property market uncertainty, Brits remain obsessed with the value of their home as well as those of their neighbours, friends and family. This year’s Property Rich List shows an ever-widening North-South divide and whilst house prices in some of the most expensive areas of the country have fallen a little over the past 12 months, they have held up far better than in many of the less expensive areas.”
Click here for the full Zoopla.co.uk Property Rich List 2011
What £1m+ can get you in some of Britain’s most expensive neighbourhoods:
Property for sale in Kensington, W8
Property for sale in Chelsea, SW3
Property for sale in Knightsbridge, SW7
Property for sale in Guildford, GU25
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For further information, please contact PR Team on pr@zoopla.co.uk or +44 (0)20 3873 8770.
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