The latest research from Zoopla has revealed that there are now more than 600,000 property millionaires in Britain.
Since January the amount of homeowners whose property is valued at £1m or more has risen by 75,796 (14%). This growth has taken the total number of property millionaires to 622,939, 2.2% of the UK population. Unsurprisingly, the vast majority (82%) of these million-pound pads are located in London and the South East.
London, for so long the most attractive property hub in the country, was particularly dominant. 61% of Britain’s million-pound homes can be found in the capital. Altogether, 380,337 homes in London are now above the million-pound threshold. That’s a 10% increase even from the beginning of 2015.
The capital’s property millionaires are predominantly located in famously affluent areas such as Westminster (51,607) and Kensington and Chelsea (44,972). However, these areas have actually seen the smallest growth in £1 million plus homes of any borough, increasing by just 0.9% and 0.6% respectively. Surprisingly, the boroughs that saw the biggest rises are situated within the top 10 lowest average priced boroughs in the capital. These include Newham, Barking & Dagenham, Newham, Redbridge and Waltham Forest.
Away from the capital, the East of England and Yorkshire and the Humber experienced the largest rise in property millionaires, up by 28% and 24% since January. Wales, by contrast, has the lowest number of million pound properties in Britain (1,404 in total), despite an uplift of 11% since the start of the year.
Scotland, meanwhile, was the only part of the UK to see a fall in the number of million pound homes in 2015, dropping by 4.5% to below 9,000 since January.
“It’s interesting to see that areas such as the East of England and Yorkshire have seen bigger percentage rises in the numbers of property millionaires over the last 12 months compared with the south which typically dominates,” Zoopla’s Lawrence Hall said. “However, the number of properties valued at more than £1m in the south still outweigh the rest of Britain boosted by wealthy hotspots such as Kensington & Chelsea and Westminster.”
