NEW FIGURES suggest that the London property market started to heat up again in February, building up strength after the usual seasonal slowdown.
Prices rose 5.2 per cent between January and February alone, according to Rightmove, reversing small price reductions at the end of last year. An average house coming to market in London is now priced at around £541,313, says the group.
Prices in London have grown by 11.2 per cent over the last 12 months, with Rightmove citing a “buying frenzy” in parts of east London, with price increases of up to 29.7 per cent in Tower Hamlets, and above 15 per cent in a handful of others.
“The capital shows no signs of slowing down in most price brackets. With upwards price pressure likely to remain, affordability ratios will approach a ceiling beyond which few buyers can reach. Time will tell where that limit is,” said Rightmove director Miles Shipside.
More data from estate agents Haart suggest an even more rapid boost to market activity during the year to January, with prices up 18.4 per cent, and particularly strong price growth in east London.
That would mean that the average house price has risen by more than double the amount that the average Londoner was paid over the past 12 months. A typical London home rose in price by £69,784 over the year, against an average salary of £34,216, according to Haart.
And an average London property stayed only five and a half weeks on the market in the final quarter of 2013, according to a third piece of research by residential agent Hamptons International, while homes in Wales and the north east of England take more than twice as long to sell.
The amount of time houses in the capital now stay on the market for has dropped by two weeks since the same quarter in 2012.
