London luxury residential market Surge to Record on foreign buyers

London ‘Super Prime’ Home Sales Surge to Record on Overseas Purchasers
Overseas buyers make up 65 percent of the London market for homes costing more than 5 million pounds

Buyers from the Middle East, North Africa, Eastern Europe and former Soviet Union are pushing prices in London ‘Super Prime’ Home Sales to new records. Values in the west London neighborhoods have risen 93 percent and 94 percent since 2006 compared with 87 percent across prime central London residential real estate.

The number of houses and apartments that sold for more than 5 million pounds ($8 million) rose to 262 from 200 in the nine months through September, 31 percent more than a year earlier, said real-estate broker Savills Plc.

Overseas buyers make up 65 percent of the market for homes costing more than 5 million pounds, according to the report. The costliest purchases remain concentrated in central London neighborhoods such as Belgravia, Knightsbridge and Mayfair, said Lucian Cook, Savills’s director of residential research.

Four penthouse apartments at the Porchester Building near London’s Paddington Station are expected to sell at 1,200 pounds a square foot, property broker Hamptons International said to bloomberg. The six-story Victorian site, which has 41,500 square feet of office space, was put on sale today at 28 million pounds.

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