economy
Asking prices for newly listed homes in UK’s richest borough fall by £100k in one month
Fierce competition in some areas of London means landlord purchasers are making successful lowball offers
TL;DR
- Average asking prices for homes listed for sale in the UK fell by 2% in August, the largest August drop in eight years.
- The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea saw a £95,000 drop in average new asking prices in one month, from £1,648,148 to £1,552,970.
- London experienced the biggest regional price drop, with a 4.4% decrease over the past month.
- The number of homes for sale in London is at its highest in 16 years, leading to intense competition among sellers.
- Buy-to-let investors are capitalizing on the cooling market, making more lowball offers that are increasingly being accepted by sellers.
- Landlords accounted for 14.1% of home purchases in Great Britain in July, up from the year-to-date average of 12.4%.
- More than half (56%) of offers from investor buyers in July were at least 10% below the initial asking price, the highest figure since April 2020.
- 27% of investor offers at 10% or more below asking price were accepted in July, rising to 41% for leasehold properties.
- Some flats are struggling to find buyers, with the leasehold system blamed for the lack of interest.