House price boom reaches Somerset's Brendon Hills and Chew Valley
02-03-2014
Geese gather in front of the Winding House, part of the old West Somerset Mineral Line built between 1857-1861, which stands at the top of The Incline near Raleigh's Cross on the Brendon Hills, one of the country's property hotspots Picture: Fran Stothard
By Western Daily Press
House price boom reaches Somerset's Brendon Hills and Chew Valley
The house price boom from London and the south east has reached some parts of the West, with average prices rising towards £1 million.
That is the finding of a report compiled by analysts Property Database and estate agents Savills, which identified 43 areas of the country – mainly in the south east – where the average house price had now reached seven figures.
The West is not far behind, with rich home-buyers moving out of London looking for a rural idyll. The Brendon Hills in Somerset were listed as the most expensive spot to buy a home in the West. The average sale price in 2013 was a staggering £867,869, which has risen by 56 per cent in the past five years and an eye-watering 221 per cent in the past decade.
Six of the other 11 areas in the West highlighted by the report are in the Cotswolds, to the north of Cirencester. The Ampneys and the Coln Valley have an average sale price of £586,215, which has risen by a quarter since the house price crash of 2007-2008. The Three Rivers area of the north Cotswolds also has an average house price of well over half a million, as does the Postlebury area of the Mendips, where the average sale price of £578,705 has more than doubled in the past ten years.
Three areas of the commuter belt to the south of Bath and Bristol are also named by the report. The Chewton Mendip and Ston Easton areas have seen average house prices rise by 70 per cent in the past ten years, while the north side of the Chew Valley is still recovering from the crash.
Average prices have actually fallen by seven per cent in the past five years, but the 65 per cent rise over the past ten years shows the extent of the pre-crash housing bubble.
The second highest average house price can be found in an area south of Bath, where a typical house sells for £648,720, which has jumped 61 per cent in the past five years alone.
Wiltshire is also experiencing a housing boom in rural areas. The prospect of rail electrification is sending house prices in the east of the county soaring.
The average price of a house in the Aldbourne and Ramsbury areas, between Marlborough and Swindon, has jumped by 48 per cent in the past five years and now stands at £549,379.
Lucian Cook, the author of the report, said: "There are now very real magnets of wealth beyond the capital. A lot of areas have yet to feel the London ripple effect, so we expect to see them performing very strongly in the year ahead.
"We are already seeing this in the inner commuter ring."