Prime Demand Dips as London’s high end market remains challenging

The latest index by London agency Benham and Reeves shows that buyer demand for both prime (£2m+) and super prime homes (£10m+) has fallen during the first quarter of the year.

Just a handful of locations have seen an increase in buyer appetites.

The index monitors demand for London’s most expensive properties based on the level of market activity seen between the £2m to £10m threshold and the super prime market of £10m+.

Demand is based on the proportion of all homes listed for sale across the prime market that have already been sold subject to contract. 

Prime Market - £2m-£10m 

Demand across London’s core prime market fell by 1.7% in Q1 2024, with fewer than one in five (19%) of homes listed finding a buyer. 

Demand across the core segment of the prime London market was also down on an annual basis by 1.8%.

Chiswick was home to the strongest level of prime London buyer demand at 49.1%, however, it’s Canary Wharf that has seen the largest quarterly increase, up 7.7% since Q4 of last year. 

Wandsworth (up 6.3%) and Fulham (3.9%) also saw some of the strongest quarterly increases in demand, with Putney enjoying the largest annual increase at 13.3%. 

Super Prime Market - £10m+

Across the super prime London market, buyer demand remained largely static on a quarterly basis, falling by just 0.1% between Q4 of last year and the first quarter of 2024. However, when compared to Q1 of last year, super prime buyer demand has fallen by 5.5% annually. 

Marylebone is the hottest spot of the super prime market at present, with 6.5% of all homes listed finding a buyer in Q1 2024. 

Victoria has seen the strongest uplift in buyer demand in Q1, climbing by 5.6% versus Q4 2023, followed by Regents Park (5%) and Marylebone (3.5%). 

At 3.1%, Belgravia has seen the strongest uplift in super prime buyer demand on an annual basis.

Director of Benham and Reeves, Marc von Grundherr, comments: “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.”