The most and least expensive places to buy property

Find out where you’ll pay the most and least to purchase a square metre of space in Britain.

The average square metre of space in a British home costs £2,033, but the actual cost varies wildly depending on where you want to live.

New research from Halifax looked at the typical house price paid over the 12 months to May and divided this by the average area of a home (excluding external space) to determine an average cost per square metre for towns across Great Britain.

The most expensive places to buy property

Here are the most expensive towns to buy property by square metre in Great Britain, according to Halifax.

Source: Halifax

Unsurprisingly, London continues to dominate the most expensive areas to buy property on a per square metre basis.

Kensington and Chelsea was the most expensive area with an average of £11,635 paid per square metre – nearly six times the national average of £2,033. The borough is the only area in Britain with an average price above £10,000, with Westminster the next priciest at £9,571.

Halifax says 16 areas in Greater London now have an average price in excess of £5,000 per square metre, which is four more than last year.

Altrincham in Cheshire remains the most expensive town outside southern England, with an average price of £2,446 per square metre.

Altrincham is followed by a group of towns in the West Midlands including Solihull (£2,367), Warwick (£2,363) and Leamington Spa (£2,353).

The Scottish cities of Edinburgh (£2,297) and Aberdeen (£2,281) are the next most expensive areas outside London. Harrogate (£2,196), Sale (£2,138), Cheadle (£2,033) and York (£2,024) complete the top 10.

The least expensive towns to buy property

Now here are the most affordable areas to buy property by square metre in Britain.

Source: Halifax

The top 10 towns with the lowest prices per square metre are all outside southern England.

Aberdare in South Wales's average price of £910 was less than a tenth of the average price per square metre in Kensington & Chelsea.

Five of the towns surveyed have an average price below £1,000 – less than half the average for Britain.

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Price changes since 2010

Over the last five years prices per square metre have risen by 18%, from £1,719 in 2010 to £2,033 in 2015.

Regionally Greater London experienced substantially faster growth than anywhere else in Britain with an average rise of 45%.

The South East (22%) recorded the next biggest rise, followed by East Anglia (17%), East Midlands (12%) and West Midlands (12%).

But in the South West (10%), Yorkshire & the Humber (9%), North West (8%), Wales (7%), Scotland (5%) and the North (3%), growth has been more modest.

Hackney in London has recorded the biggest increase in prices by square metre over the last five years.

The top towns that had the highest house price growth on a per square metre basis since 2010 were all London boroughs.

Source: Halifax

Price changes since 1995

Looking back over the last 20 years the report found the cost of purchasing a square metre of space has risen 227% from £621 in 1995 to £2,033 in 2015.

At a regional level there’s been a big increase in the north-south divide since. Prices per square metre have risen by 388% in Greater London, which is more than twice the increases in northern England, Scotland, Wales and the Midlands.

Again the top ten areas that have seen the biggest price increases per square metre since 1995 are all located in London.

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