London property 'a safe place to invest cash'
Investing in buy-to-let in London could prove a safe bet for those looking for a return on capital.
According to Mouseprice, an online source of UK property market information, investment property London must be treated separately to other areas of the country as the capital possesses its own unique property market dynamics.
With a large number of foreign buyers as well as people from the UK looking to move to the capital, there is a great deal of upward pressure on prices.
Therefore, landlords could find that, even when property prices in other parts of the country are struggling, London can offer a strong return on investment.
"London has always been a unique case in that the supply and demand of property in London is [affected] by overseas cash and lots of overseas buyers," said Selwyn Lim, director of Mouseprice.
"The London property market is a safe place to invest cash and as long as this continues, the London market will always behave very differently [to the rest of the UK]. At the moment, the robust nature of the London market can be attributed to this."
His comments follow recent figures from property portal Rightmove, which found that national average asking prices for property rose 2.8 per cent (£6,533) in October to £239,672.
However, this was almost entirely driven by growth in the south of the country, with average asking prices in the south (£336,743) now more than double those in the north (£164,347), the biggest gulf ever recorded.
"The north in general experienced a much higher percentage price rise during the run-up to the [property] bubble bursting [in 2008], so it stands to reason that when the bubble failed, they had more to lose," said Mr Lim.
"Whilst the gap is now increasing, you could argue that the gap was narrowing in the boom years."
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