Ever wondered what lies behind the electric security gates and 9 ft walls of
Britain's most expensive streets? Well now you can find out.
The clever people at Mouseprice.com
have analysed Land Registry stats, and come up with a list of the priciest
postcodes in England and Wales. Find out about the ten most (and least)
expensive areas and click on the links below to take a peek for yourself.
1/ GREATER LONDON
The most expensive: Kensington
Square W8 - £5,534,480
Forget Paris, forget New York. London is the city of choice for the truly well
off. From Russian oligarchs and Indian steel magnates to City bankers and
wealthy entrepreneurs, le tout monde is desirous of a bolthole in
Kensington and Chelsea. Over half of London's most expensive streets are
here, but it is in Kensington
Square W8 where you will need the biggest house-buying budget in
Britain: £5,534,480 to be exact. The Tube at High Street Kensington is a
doable totter in Manolos - not that you'd be using public transport if you
lived here. West London's golden triangle is completed by Knightsbrige and
Pimlico.
The cheapest: Kingsbridge
Circus RM3 - £97,380
For the cost of a home in Kensington Square you could buy... an astonishing
56-and-a-bit properties in Kingsbridge
Circus RM3. Located between Brentwood and Romford a home here will set
you back just £97,380 - flying just under the stamp duty threshold of
£120,000.
2/ SOUTH EAST
The most expensive: Portnall
Rise GU25 - £3,446,220
The South East is rich hunting ground for those who want both City salaries
and country living. However, commuters must pay for this privilege: on
average, house prices exceed £2.5 million in the South East's 20 most
expensive streets. Anyone with postcodes starting KT10 to KT14 also has good
reason to show off. But the location of choice is very green, very pleasant
Virginia Water (Harry Potter was filmed there). A foothold here comes at a
price: Portnall
Rise GU25 in Surrey is top - property costs on average £3,446,220.
Residents can escape the day to day mundanaties of managing all that wealth
by enjoying the area's many distractions - golf courses are a mere pitch and
a put away; preening is available at Wentworth Club.
The cheapest: Amherst
Court MK15 - £39,950
For the cost of a home in Portnall Rise you could buy... a bewildering EIGHTY
SIX properties in Amherst
Court MK15. Just northeast of Milton Keynes in Willen a home here is
just £39,950.
3/ EAST
The most expensive: Park
Avenue South, AL5 - £1,881,283
Harpenden, Hertfordshire boasts the most expensive street in the East. Close
to the M25 and Luton airport - buyers pay for suburban convenience. A home
on Park
Avenue South, AL5 is the most costly and will set you back £1,881,283.
Impressed? Don't be - Park Avenue South isn't that unusual: houses in three
quarters of the 100 most expensive spots in the East cost over £1 million.
The cheapest: Austin
Avenue CO15 - £51,588
For the cost of a home in Park Avenue South you could buy... 36 properties in Austin
Avenue CO15 where the average home costs £51,588. If you are looking for
a bargain, head to Clacton-on-Sea: the area around it accounts for 60% of
the 10 least expensive streets in the East of England.
4/ NORTH WEST
The most expensive: Whitebarn
Road SK9 - £1,855,880
The popularity of Alderley Edge, Cheshire amongst footballers and their wifes
is reflected in the cost of property - the Beckhams are former residents as
are Rio Ferdinand and Michael Carrick. Just south of Manchester is it also a
favourite of commuters. The most expensive street of the lot however is Whitebarn
Road SK9 where the average home costs £1,855,880. Other
expensive postcodes are WA14 and WA15 - which account for two in five
streets in the top hundred; and SK9 and SK10 - which together account for
almost a third.
The cheapest: Oxford
Street BB9 - £21,888
For the cost of a home in Gubeon Wood you could buy... an astounding 85
properties on Oxford
Street BB9 in Lancashire - average price: £21,888.
5/ SOUTH WEST
The most expensive: Western
Avenue BH13 - £1,520,032
Visualise your dream spot in the South West, and you will also be pinpointing
the most expensive. The largest price tags are all in or on the edges of
historic spa or coastal towns. Buyers flee London for the weekend to their -
now valuable - picture postcard second homes; those escaping more
permanently have been buoyed by broadband to work from home. Postcodes in
Bath, Bristol, Cheltenham, Dartmouth, Poole and Salcombe dominate the list
of most expensive locations. But the one that comes top is Western
Avenue BH13 in Poole where the average home costs £1,520,032 - more than
three times the average for BH13. £1 million-plus properties are scattered
on nearby Mornish Road, Brudenell Avenue and Bury Road.
The cheapest: Valley Bungalows PL13 - £40,950
For the cost of a home in Western Avenue you could buy... 37 £40,950 homes at
Valley Bungalows PL13, between Plymouth and St Austell.
6/ WEST MIDLANDS
The most expensive: Luttrell
Road B74 - £1,350,283.
Birmingham's suburbs and bucolic commuter villages and hamlets around
Stratford-upon-Avon and Warwick are the most costly areas to call home.
Tiddington Road in Stratford is dubbed millionaire's row. Barnt Green and
Edgbaston account for 17 streets out of the top 100 of the most expensive
homes. Sutton Colefield (B74), just north of Birmingham, clocks the most
high-ranking positions in the West Midlands league table, but the street at
the very top is Luttrell
Road B74 where homes cost on average £1,350,283.
The cheapest: East
Street ST3 - £40,014
For the cost of a home in Luttrell Road you could buy... 33 £40,014 properties
in East
Street ST3 in Stoke-on-Trent. North of Newcastle-under-Lyme, ST6 is the
postcode where you'll find 60 per cent of the least expensive streets in the
region.
7/ EAST MIDLANDS
The most expensive: The
Ridgeway LE7 - £1,182,533
Six per cent of the top one hundred streets in the East Midlands costs more
than £750,000, but to afford the most expensive you'll need more than a
million. Properties at The
Ridgeway LE7 in Rothley cost £1,182,533 - so lovely is this tree-lined
road that locals take strolls along it and enjoy the views. Nestled in a
patchwork of fields six miles north of Leicester and a short way from the M1
Rothley was once the site of a Roman villa and working estate. Today
residents enjoy village pursuits such as cricket, bowls and tennis.
The cheapest: Sherwood
Drive NG20 - £31,550
For the cost of a home in The Ridgeway you could buy... 37 homes in Sherwood
Drive NG20 in Shirebrook, Derbyshire. Although a property recently sold
there for £40,000 the average cost of a home is £31,550.
8/ YORKSHIRE AND THE HUMBER
The most expensive: Sandmoor
Drive LS17 - £1,065,283
It is the suburbs to the north of Leeds and within easy reach of Leeds
Bradford airport which are home to the region's most expensive streets:
property prices in excess of £1 million are commonplace on Linton Lane, Tib
Garth, Alwoodley Gates and Land Head Road. The top of the list is Sandmoor
Drive LS17 where the average stands at £1,065,283. Harrogate is another
wealthy enclave - a fifth of the region's most expensive streets are here;
other desirable addresses are to be found south west of Sheffield city
centre and bordered on their western side by the Pennines.
The cheapest: Oxford
Street WF9 - £22,761.
For the cost of a home in Sandmoor Drive you could buy... 46 homes on Oxford
Street WF9 south east of Wakefield and north east of Barnsley, where the
average value is £22,761.
9/ NORTH EAST
The most expensive: Gubeon
Wood NE61 - £1,056,940
Gubeon
Wood NE61 is the only residential street in the North East where the
average house price is over £1 million - a house here costs £1,056,940.
Other hot spots are to be found north and west of Newcastle city centre:
NE20 is a postcode to ask for - or avoid depending on your financial
circumstances - when inquiring with local estate agents. Here the average
house costs £352,879. NE20 and NE3 are home to 28 of the North East's most
expensive streets. Commuters favour NE41, NE43, NE44 and NE46.
The cheapest: Tower
Green TS2 - £21,290
For the cost of a home in Gubeon Wood you could buy... almost 50 properties on Tower
Green TS2 With an average property price of £21,290 this is not only the
least expensive street in the North East, but also the cheapest in the
country.
10/ WALES
The most expensive: Cefn
Coed Road CF23 - £698,467
Close to the city but with a quick escape to country and coast Cardiff streetswith postcodes beginning in CF are amongst the most expensive in Wales. Cefn
Coed Road CF23 on the north eastern border of Cardiff is the most
expensive street of the lot - here the average property will set you back
£698,467.
The cheapest: Victoria
Street CF41 - £33,375
For the cost of a home in Cefn Coed Road you could buy... 21 properties in Victoria
Street CF41 - to the north west of Cardiff - each costing £33,375.
OK -ONLY Antipuluan Expat, Is that hot spot Indonesia?the piont for noone else to rain on the parade?I bought ocean viewland in the NE of brazil at £6000 a plot the neighbours are up for sale,I can think of nothing rosier than a bunch of english speaking expats getting a burn with!
eden myhr, london, uk
house prices have gone too far, so has rental, blame the estate agents. they push up the prices by cashing in on the obvious fact that now working from home with the benefit of broadband entices the better off to move further affield to places like the southwest and so on which have risen so high in the last years due to the agents pushing the prices up . it means that as estate agents were never that well off due to the need of selling as many properties to get the commission they so need to make it a viable business , they found that as they play god in the housing market dictating what we should pay , where we should live being the so called " hot spots " , they now reap in the huge commissions . We have all fallen victim, there is no watchdog service out there to control this activity, once you could buy not so long ago an old wreck of a house for next to nothing, they were sold in mart magazines by private sellers to just get rid of them.
helen woods, surrey, uk
These all appear to be urban or suburban areas...is that jutsifiable?
Frank Upton, Solihull,
"The only people I ever hear talking about how great Scotland is are people who don't actually live there. Funny that.
Dave Rawson, Glasgow, GB"
Scotland has great schools and hospitals, lots of sunshine (don't know about Glasgow but the East Coast is great for sun) and a public transport system to die for. No such thing as the drought to worry about, decent affordable housing... In case you haven't noticed, we English are emigrating to Scotland in our thousands, refugees from unbreathable air, broken infrastructure, and schools and hospitals bordering on a third world state, it's so long since they have been refurbished.
Debbie Abuhelewa, Edinburgh, Scotland
"Is it just me or do no parties seem to care about our housing crisis?"
There isn't that big a housing crisis around the UK.
Its just that some of us are too snobby to live in the cheaper houses.
On top of that, it seems that 90% of graduate jobs are in London and the SE.
If graduate jobs were distributed around the UK then house prices would be a lot more equal. There are more than 12m people living in the mid Northern belt (think Liverpool across to Hull - M62 corridor if you will) and how many graduate and higher skilled jobs are there compared to London and the SE.
Spread the jobs and you will achieve increased standards of living throughout the UK, housing becomes easier because there are free houses up here and a better distribution of wealth.
This government is full of rubbish. The last article I read was about Swindon getting a makeover... how about someone gives some incentives for bringing big business to the north of Birmingham, then house prices would equal out.
Jamie, Halifax, West Yorkshire
The idea that Kensington Square is the most expensive address in London is just poppycock, and one can only assume that the methodology used is fundamentally flawed.
Philip Cronin, Bedford,
I'm very surprised Kensington Palace Gardens is not more expensive than Kensington Square. Laskmi Mittal paid something like £48 million for his place there .....
Richard, London,
Presumably anyone with enough money to buy a place in Virginia Water would know it's to the South West of London, and not the South East?
Mike, of Tunbridge Wells, (to the South East)
Mike C, Tunbridge Wells, England, where else?
Property prices in Kensington and Chelsea are a tax on pretension. I imagine it takes a certain type of wealthy person to aspire to living there.
William, London, UK
Scotland is most likely not covered as the Land Registry is set up by statute and England and Wales are one legal system whereas Scotland is separate.
D, Cambridge,
Is it entirely coincidence that the lowest property prices in England are within walking distance of the PM's constituency?
David, Birmingham,
when you write about property areas you fail to look depth at north wales. wales being classed as if it were a town and not a country. north wales and south wales often " lumped together " at best. for example there is an area of outstanding beauty on the sw coast of anglesey, newborough.this village is situated about a mile from approx. 200 acres of sand dunes and wonderful coastline.it is yet only 15mins away from uni city of bangor.it is only one and half hours of travelling time to liverpool and approx.two hours travel ,drive that is from manchestermain train service from bangor to anywhere in britain.approx.20 mins drive to holyhead which is a main ferry route.and yet property is still very underpriced.newborough is like going backwards to the 1960's untouched. magic!
ingrid overton, bangor, gwynedd
1 property for the price of 86? Hardly an equal distribution of wealth! And all that hapenned while Labour were in power! Not only can I not afford a house but I've also lost faith in the Labour party. Is it just me or do no parties seem to care about our housing crisis?
John K, London, UK
Where the hell is Scotland in this list? Has anyone seen the property prices explode in the North?
Akash, Edinburgh,
The only people I ever hear talking about how great Scotland is are people who don't actually live there. Funny that.
Dave Rawson, Glasgow, GB
You should also check out the lovely leafy and quite traditional Malone area over here in Belfast, particularly Malone Park....they're mighty rich you cannot buy anything on that street for less than 1 million pounds......they are gorgoues houses though.
Kerry, Portadown, N. Ireland
Er Correction - The 10 most expensive places to live in England and Wales........
Pilko, London,
Greg,
Scotland is the Great in GB as most Scots will tell you. Britain is the country they enriched.
Linda , Horsham, UK
Nice to see Scotland included in the most expensive places to live in Britain...
Greg, Rochester, NY
FOUL! That's like altering score-cards after a round of golf!
MikeM, St. Albans, England
This shows up the arbitrary nature of the boundaries imposed on England for Euro elections and Mr Prescott's regional quangos. It makes no sense that Milton Keynes is considered to be in the South East by virtue of being in Buckinghamshire, whereas Harpenden, half an hour south east down the M1 towards London and full of City commuters, is supposed to be in the East.
Nick, London,
I daresay that the "Indian steel magnets", at least, find the railway tracks at High Street Kensington extremely attractive . . . .
MikeM, St. Albans, England
People will have a slight problem using mouseprice.com fully. When you ask for an evaluation the webpage asks for your 'State' (ie US State) as a requirement, and will not process the request if you are from a UK address.
So 'taking a peek' didn't work for me, author!
Annie, Bath, UK
These figures are interesting however do they give an accurate representation? If the figures are taken from the Land Registery, I understand that they include wrecks of houses, colapsing with subsidence, etc.? The low prices are therefore out of proportion!
G. A Turner, Cheltenham,
Indian steel magnets (sic)??!!
Chris Thompson, Surrey,