England and Wales' most expensive streets: from Kensington to Cobham (original) (raw)

It is where Oscar-winning actor Dustin Hoffman reportedly owns a house, and its most desirable property is thought to be worth £20m – although as recently as seven years ago a flat was sold there for less than £500,000. Victoria Road in the heart of Kensington in west London has been named the most expensive residential street in England and Wales, with an average house price of £8,006,000.

The road, which is also home to the Vietnamese embassy, topped a list of the priciest streets published by Lloyds Bank on Friday.

All the top 50 most expensive streets in England and Wales are located in southern England, with more than half (28) in London and a further 19 in the south-east. The Dorset town of Poole is the only place not in south-east England that makes it into the top 50.

50 most expensive streets in England and Wales, 2015

Just a short distance from Kensington Palace, the London home of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Victoria Road is made up of 64 properties, some of which date back to the 1840s. A six-bedroom house there sold for £13m in July 2014, and a five-bedroom apartment is currently being advertised on property website Rightmove for £7.95m.

In 1881, W S Clarke wrote in his book The Suburban Homes of London that Victoria Road “is noted for being inhabited by artists of high standing”, though it is unclear whether that still holds true today. Certainly, this is a neighbourhood popular with hedge fund managers and overseas investors, though residents have praised its “village feel”.

In 2008, a flat in the road sold for what might now seem like the bargain price of £475,000. It is now likely to be worth almost £1.7m, according to property information website Mouseprice, which has put an estimated current value on each of the road’s properties ranging from £925,800-£19,956,000. If the latter near-£20m valuation is correct, the individual or company who bought that particular house is likely to be feeling very pleased with themselves: the data from Mouseprice , which uses Land Registry figures, suggests they paid £11.5m for it in early 2010.

London's most expensive streets

London’s most expensive streets

Such is the pull of living in Kensington and Chelsea that no fewer than 12 streets in the royal borough feature in the list of the 20 most expensive in the country. These include Egerton Crescent, with an average price of £7,550,000, followed by Manresa Road (£7,359,000), De Vere Gardens (£6,606,000) and Drayton Gardens (£5,954,000).

The four priciest roads not in London are all located in either Leatherhead or Cobham, both in Surrey. Cobham is where Chelsea’s training ground is based, so unsurprisingly it has become a favourite for footballers. Icklingham Road and nearby Harebell Hill, both in Cobham, each boast an average price-tag of just over £3m.

The Sandbanks area of Poole is frequently described as a millionaires’ seaside idyll where even empty plots of land go on the market for seven-figure sums. Sandbanks Road is the town’s most expensive street, with an average house price of £2,493,000, followed by Western Avenue (£2,433,000) and Haig Avenue (£2,200,000).

Most expensive streets in England and Wales, by region

Newton Road, close to the Cambridge University Botanic Garden, is the most expensive street in East Anglia, with an average house price of £1,853,000. Nine of the 10 priciest streets in East Anglia are in Cambridge, and most of these are close to the main university area, in the CB2 and CB3 postal districts.

The most expensive streets outside southern England are concentrated in some of the areas south of Manchester that are known for their “footballers’ mansions”. They include Castle Hill in Prestbury, Macclesfield (£1,662,000), Macclesfield Road in Alderley Edge (£1,499,000), Torkington Road, Wilmslow (£1,330,000) and Goughs Lane, Knutsford (£1,299,000).

Other pricey streets around England are Lyndon Road in Oakham, Rutland (£1,363,000), Tiddington Road in Stratford-upon-Avon (£1,349,000), Rutland Drive, Harrogate (£1,191,000) and Graham Park Road in Gosforth, Newcastle (£1,029,000).

In Wales, Druidstone Road in Old St Mellons, Cardiff, is the most expensive, though even that street’s £793,000 average price-tag is less than a tenth of that in Victoria Road. The most expensive streets in Wales are mostly in Cardiff – they include Rudry Road (£781,000), Lisvane Road (£548,000) and Llyswen Road (£547,000). Other pricey streets located away from the Welsh capital are Lady Housty Avenue in Newton, Swansea (£568,000), Cwrt-Y-Vil Road in Penarth in the Vale of Glamorgan (£564,000) and Langland Court Road in Langland, Swansea (£550,000).

Andrew Mason, mortgages director at Lloyds Bank, said that while the largest concentration of England’s most expensive streets is in Kensington and Chelsea, outside London, the equivalent “millionaires’ rows” are generally located away from central areas, where buyers are typically attracted by larger properties and more green space.

These areas can be as diverse as Surrey, Cheshire, Poole on the south coast, and the so-called Yorkshire “Golden Triangle” between Harrogate, York and north Leeds.