More than 600,000 UK homeowners are now property millionaires
More than 600,000 UK homeowners are now so-called property millionaires as escalating prices pushed more homes over the £1m-mark.
Research released by property website Zoopla said the number of homes worth £1m or more increased by 75,796 – up 14 per cent – since January, taking the total number of property millionaires to 622,939.
This means that 2.2 per cent of all homeowners have a property worth £1m or more, with well over half (61 per cent) located in London.
In total, 380,337 homes in the city are now above the million-pound threshold, marking a 33,871 – or 10 per cent increase – since the start of the year.
Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea have the highest number of £1m-plus homes – 51,607 and 44,972 respectively. However this was almost unchanged on last year – up 0.9 per cent and 0.6 per cent each.
In fact, the boroughs that experienced the biggest increase in property millionaires were those with the top 10 lowest average priced boroughs. Newham, Redbridge and Waltham Forest all saw increases of over 55 per cent.
Hackney and Havering increased the number of £1m-plus homes by 46 per cent to 7,977 and 1,134 respectively.
Outside of London, the East of England and Yorkshire and The Humber saw the largest increases of property millionaires, up 28 per cent and 24 per cent respectively since January.
At the other end of the spectrum, Wales has the fewest million pound properties in Britain with only 1,404 in total—despite, a significant 11 per cent uplift since January. Meanwhile, Scotland was the sole region to see a decrease, falling 4.5 per cent to below 9,000 since the start of the year.
Lawrence Hall of Zoopla said: “With an improving economy and the ongoing lack of housing supply, this continues to put upward pressure on house prices at all levels of the market and has nudged a whole new raft of properties over the £1m mark. A price tag that was once the exclusive preserve of stately homes or massive mansions is now an increasingly common label for more modest houses, particularly in the capital.”