Demand for prime London homes valued at above £2M had declined in the first financial quarter, according to the latest analysis. Super prime property, valued at above £10M, has also seen a drop in demand – with just a handful of locations seeing an increase in buyer appetites.
Benham and Reeves have revealed from their London Buyer Demand Index that market activity has shown consumers straying from luxury London properties. Demand is based on the proportion of all homes listed for sale across the prime market that have already been sold subject to contract.
Director of Benham and Reeves, Marc von Grundherr, commented:
“We had seen signs that buyers were returning to London’s high-end housing market but this momentum seems to have stalled during the first three months of this year and it’s likely that this trend could continue with the removal of non-dom status from April next year.
It’s not just the prime sales market that is struggling. While London overall continues to benefit from extremely high rental demand, appetite for prime rentals has fallen, with enquiries down between four to eight percent across prime rental thresholds.”
The core prime market fell by -1.7% in the first quarter of the year, with fewer than one in five per cent of homes listed finding a buyer. Annually the figures have also seen a decline of – 1.8%.
Chiswick, Wandsworth and Fulham are the London areas that have seen the strongest market increase for prime property, with Canary Wharf coming out on top with the largest quarterly increase. In the Chancellor’s budget this Spring, plans to invest in Canary Wharf’s growing financial district have been announced, with significant investment mapped out to create the ‘next Silicon Valley’ right here in the UK.
London’s Super prime market has remained largely static, falling by -0.01%. However when compared to the first quarter of last year and previous years, Super prime properties have seen a steady decrease of five per cent annually. Marylebone is the hottest spot of the super prime market at present, with 6.5% of all homes listed finding a buyer and Victoria has seen a large uplift in buyer demand. Annually, Belgravia has seen most demand annually.
