Sales of 'super-prime' £5m properties surge outside of London's hotspots - Boodle Hatfield

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Article
11 Nov 2019

Sales of ‘super-prime’ £5m properties surge outside of London’s hotspots

London’s super prime residential market is rapidly expanding outside its traditional core of Westminster, and Kensington & Chelsea shows a study by Boodle Hatfield, the leading private wealth law firm.

Sales of residential properties worth more than £5million in Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea fell by 23% from 339 to 262 last year whilst sales in the rest of London for £5m homes rose by 19% from 90 to 107 (year end June 30 – see graph below)*. Sales of £5m+ residential properties outside London reached a new high of 47.

New developments reaching completion in 2019 in Southwark and Camden have contributed to these changes. These developments have allowed developers to deliver the brand new, larger floorplate apartments that international HNWs continue to look for. However, it also shows that at the very top end of the global luxury apartments market that buyers have been prepared to buy outside of the traditional core super-prime areas of London.

Blackfriars Road in Southwark, home to the One Blackfriars development, topped the list of Top 50 streets in London for super-prime sales with the greatest number of £5m+ residential property sales, with 16 sales in 2018/19*.

Other streets outside of the City of Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea also recorded multiple £5m+ property sales last year, including Queenstown Road in Battersea (three sales) and Castelnau in Barnes (two sales).

Saskia Arthur, Head of Residential Property, at Boodle Hatfield, says: “Belgravia, Chelsea, Mayfair, Knightsbridge and Kensington still remain the key target areas for HNWs who want to purchase properties, but some buyers are more willing to look elsewhere than they were previously.”

“A lack of stock in these areas, coupled with slightly lower prices for luxury properties with the right level of specification elsewhere, appears to have assisted international HNWs being more flexible over location.”

“The continued weakness of the pound particularly against the dollar over an extended period has also made London properties cheaper, so there has been an appetite to buy whilst the pound remain low.”

London continues to drive to UK’s super prime-property market

London continues to drive the UK’s super prime-property market. The total number of £5m+ residential property sales in London accounted for 89% out of 416 sales in the UK in 2018/19. London also leads £10m+ residential property sales, accounting for 93 out of 101 sales in the UK last year.

This article was first published in The Times, CityAM and EGi on 11 November 2019.