New Times,
New Thinking.

  1. Business
20 May 2013updated 22 Oct 2020 3:55pm

Who lives in central London now?

52 per cent of all £2m+ homes in central London are bought by overseas buyers.

By Oliver Williams

Who lives in central London now? Anybody who has strolled the stuccoed streets of Belgravia and the verdant squares of Mayfair will have inevitably asked this question. The streets are filled with imported supercars and the sound of foreign languages, not to mention the thoroughly un-British clothes, shops and restaurants. Belgravia, Knightsbridge, Mayfair and, to an extent, Chelsea are no longer desirable addresses for the well-to-do British, such is the extent to which their prices have been driven up by foreign buyers.

There has been a tidal wave of recent research to underpin this point. Earlier this year, Savills announced that all the property of London’s 10 most expensive boroughs are more expensive than the entire combined worth of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The capital sees more house deals in excess of £100m than anywhere in the world and in the past year.

Subscribe to The New Statesman today for only £1 per week
Content from our partners
Securonomics? Don’t forget UK agriculture
The future of exams
Skills are the key to economic growth