North of England outperforms the South for property investments
Property investments in the North of England are outperforming the South in terms of capital appreciation and rental yields, research from Sourced Franchise reveals.
The property investment platform analysed annual changes in house prices, rental values, and rental yields for all regions of England to identify the strongest housing market performance.
In the North, the average house price has increased from £205,875 in May 2022 to £211,392 in May 2023 – an annual growth rate of 2.7 per cent.
While in the South, there is an annual change of only 0.8 per cent, with the average price going from £385,719 to £388,917.
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For rental yields across the North, the average yield is currently 4.7 per cent while the South stands at 4.2 per cent.
“There has long been a disparity between England’s Northern and Southern housing markets,” said Chris Kirkwood, director at Sourced Franchise. “But historically, the common narrative has been a booming South and a struggling North. Our latest analysis proves that when it comes to property investment, it simply isn’t that black and white.
The North is now outperforming the South on multiple fronts and is, in many ways, now the driving force of positive growth. For property investors, the North now offers much better opportunities.”
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England’s Northern regions are the North West, North East, West Midlands, East Midlands, and Yorkshire & Humber.
The South is made up of the South East, South West, London, and the East of England.
“Not only are prices significantly more affordable than the South, making it the more accessible market, but returns are also markedly stronger,” Kirkwood said. Much of this is being driven by a shift of national focus away from London and towards cities such as Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, and Newcastle. We’re seeing major businesses move north from the capital, including the likes of Channel 4 and the BBC, and we’re also seeing young families escape the claustrophobic prices in the South for the more accessible markets up North.
“We fully expect this pattern of Northern dominance to continue into the foreseeable future.”
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