High-End Splash £2.5bn in London’s Top Postcodes

London’s £5m-plus sector has been “surprisingly active” in 2020, as HNW buyers look to “take advantage of the value in the market”.

Transactions above this price point in the first three quarters were up 12% on the same period in 2019 – and Q3 turned out to be the strongest three months for £5m-plus deals in five years.

The figures even appear to have taken the research team aback: “These are results that nobody could have anticipated”, added the firm “…not least because international arrivals into the UK remain at a fraction of normal levels.”

88 £5m+ transactions were recorded in Q1, followed by 43 in Q2, and a whopping 95 in the three months to the end of September. The combined total of 226 is some way ahead of last year, and a mere 9.6% behind Q1-Q3 2018. Q3’s bumper tally added up to a total value of £877m, which was almost back to Q1 levels.

Year-to-date sales now stand at £2.56 billion, 5.1% up on the same period in 2019, but still 20% below the total spent in Q1–Q3 2018.

Interestingly, those writing off the PCL heartlands look to have jumped the gun…The five postcodes of SW1, SW3, W8, NW8 and W1 – all of them traditional favourites – accounted for over half of this year’s £5m-plus sales.

Savills is forecasting compound growth of 17.5% for the second-hand PCL market over the coming five years.