Map: UK house prices are still below 2007 peak in Wales, the North and southern Scotland – but have soared past them in London, Bristol, York and Manchester
London’s house prices may have surged well beyond the prices of the last property boom, but that’s hardly true of the whole country.
Looking at average house prices today against what they were eight years ago shows prices are still below their 2007 peak in about half the country.
The map of England, Scotland and Wales, put together by Johnny Morris, research director at property services group Countrywide, reveals the country is split fairly evenly.
Booming property prices hit a peak in 2007. The average UK house price soared past this in July 2014 – but not everywhere.
Prices in the South East, part of the Midlands, the Scottish Highlands and some parts of Manchester, York and Bristol have flown past this peak.
But in almost all of the North, all of Wales and the South West, southern Scotland and the better part of the Midlands, homeowners who bought at the height of the last boom have yet to see their house price return to the same value.
Johnny Morris said to City PM that he put together the map to illustrate the "distinct divide" between London and the south, and the rest of the country:
Generally we present the housing crisis as being a uniform problem across the UK. But in fact different parts of our country have very different problems, which need different solutions.
While many areas in the South are struggling under the weight of huge demand meaning housing affordability is a primary issue, other areas problems are much more about the local economy.
London’s prices, you will be entirely unsurprised to learn, have left the previous peak far behind, as prices soared over 40 per cent in this time period. In 2007, the average house price hit a record high of roughly £350,000. Today, a home will cost you about £530,000.
