A small market town in the English county of Suffolk saw the highest asking price growth in Britain in 2017, according to a report Thursday by U.K. real estate website Rightmove.
The average asking price for a home Sudbury, around two hours northeast of London, increased 13.1% from £234,569 (US$313,175) in 2016 to £265,291 (US$354,192) in 2017, compared with a national annual rise of 1.2%, the report said. The research excludes London.
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"Sudbury ticks all the boxes in terms of location, standard of living, mix of attractive properties and wealth of amenities," said Dan Gurney, area manager at William H Brown estate agents in Sudbury, in the report. "Sudbury is a property hotspot for those buyers attracted to its close proximity to Cambridge and range of Georgian and Victorian properties, plus we’ve seen a wave of buyers from London–it has certainly benefited from a ‘ripple out’ effect where buyers look for more for their money away from climbing city house prices."
An £850,000 (US$1.13 million) five-bedroom house is currently the most expensive home on the market in the town, according to Rightmove, followed by a Grade II Listed five-bedroom property that’s asking £700,000 (US$934,577).
Sudbury was followed by Sowerby Bridge, a market town in West Yorkshire, which saw asking prices jump 12.5%, from £170,398 (US$227,500) in 2016 to £191,796 (US$256,068) in 2017, and Kendal, another market town, in the county of Cumbria, which saw average asking prices rise from £205,622 (US$274,527) to £226,163 (US$301,952), an increase of 10%.
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The report’s findings back up other recent statistics that show how fast regional areas outside of London are growing, while sales and price growth in the capital slow due to stamp duty, and waning international investor interest in the city due to the upcoming Brexit.
Though prices of residential real estate in prime central London appear to have leveled out, after a 15.2% drop since the city’s peak in mid-2014, according to a December report from real estate adviser Savills.
The most searched place for both buyers and renters outside of London was the southwestern City of Bristol, which knocked Manchester from the top spot this year. York and Norwich both rose a place each for buyer searches second and third place respectively, while Edinburgh rose to fourth after featuring in 10th place last year, the report said.