Prices of luxury homes in central London rose at their slowest pace in five months during February, as more homeowners put their properties on the market to benefit from 16 months of price gains, according to a report by London-based brokerage firm Knight Frank.
It showed that values of homes and apartments costing £3.7 million (S$7.4 million) climbed 11.6 percent on average from the previous year. Prices grew 0.7 percent from January and now stand at 8.9 percent higher than the market’s last low point in March 2009.
Foreign investors are also turning to the London property market for wealth preservation, as they face economic, financial or political upheavals in their home markets. Knight Frank said Italian buyers replaced Russians as the biggest group of non-UK buyers this year, accounting for eight percent of all transactions recorded.
Liam Bailey, Head of Residential Research at Knight Frank, said prices of luxury homes in central London will likely grow five percent this year.
“The longer prime house prices continue to rise, the obvious question continues to emerge — will these rises eventually be replaced by falls?” he said.
For the whole country, residential property prices grew 0.9 percent last month from the previous year, as first-time buyers took advantage of the tax exemption that will expire this month.
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