New figures have shown that almost £70 billion of property has changed hands in England and Wales during 2021 so far.
The research, collated by Keller Williams, took Land Registry sold house data looking at January to May 2021, and discovered that £68.8 billion of residential property has been bought in the period.
They also investigated local data, finding that nine of the top 10 UK postcodes by total volume of sales were in London — with only Brighton & Hove’s BN3 postcode, which takes in the Hove side of the city, getting in at number eight.
Agents Sawyer & Co have this two-bedroom apartment for sale at £525,000 in what they describe as ‘one of Hove’s most iconic postcodes’. They probably knew the value of BN3 well before this report came out.
London’s NW3 postcode — which includes Hampstead Heath and much of the property around Primrose Hill — topped the list, with £262.5m of property sold since the start of the year.
A five-bedroom semi on Hampstead Heath such as this one costs £13.5 million via Knight Frank. It’s not hard to see how the total property sales for the area have racked up to almost £300 million in 2021.
The large, leafy and overwhelmingly residential areas of south-west London around Wandsworth and Wimbledon take the next three spots, with the SW19, SW11 and SW18 postcodes, while Kensington & Chelsea (W8 and W11) and Hammersmith & Fulham (SW6) are the next three on the list.
This penthouse in Earl’s Court, SW6, is on the market at £8.9 million.
Hove (BN3) is next, with Waltham Forest (E17) and Barnet (NW11) rounding out the top 10.
While it’s an interesting list, the size of the areas in question and the number of residential properties that they encompass has clearly been a major factor in the figures — SL6, centred on populous Maidenhead, is fourth in the list of non-London postcodes, yet SL5, which takes in the golf clubs and race courses of Sunningdale and Ascot, is outside the top 10.
This is ‘the most refined and most sophisticated timber framed mansion in England’, according to Pevsner. It’s in SL6, and is up with Savills at £10 million.
Yet it’s still an interesting take on the property market, and the raw stats alone are a sobering illustration of just how hot the property market has been running.
Postcodes in England and Wales with greatest total property sales (Jan-May 2021)
| POSTCODE | AREA | TOTAL SALES |
| NW3 | Camden / Barnet | £262,487,046 |
| SW19 | Merton / Wandsworth | £248,800,270 |
| SW11 | Wandsworth / Lambeth | £234,858,700 |
| SW18 | Wandsworth | £227,625,878 |
| W8 | Kensington and Chelsea | £225,963,338 |
| W11 | Kensington & Chelsea / Westminster / Hammersmith & Fulham | £212,426,624 |
| SW6 | Hammersmith and Fulham | £212,004,240 |
| BN3 | Brighton and Hove | £206,087,089 |
| E17 | Waltham Forest | £201,193,176 |
| NW11 | Barnet | £197,670,500 |
Source: Land Registry via Keller Williams
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