Milton Keynes is 'new build' capital of the UK

AMID the clamour for chancellor Philip Hammond to encourage more housebuilding in Wednesday’s autumn budget, Milton Keynes has been unveiled as Britain’s new build capital.

The Milton Keynes postal area has the highest proportion of new builds in Britain, outside of London.

Five out of the top 10 areas for new build homes are in Southern England and three are in the Midlands.

Areas where more than a quarter of property sales are accounted for by new builds have a six per cent higher property price growth rate than the national average.

Milton Keynes is Britain’s top location for the highest concentration of new build properties outside of London, according to new data from Zoopla and Hometrack, with new homes accounting for more than a third (33.2 per cent) of property sales. Zoopla analysed data from Hometrack to reveal which areas of Britain are home to the highest concentration of new build properties as a share of all property sales.

The fast-growing former new town of Milton Keynes is closely followed by Crewe (29.6 per cent), which joins Middlesbrough in Teeside as one of only two areas in Northern England to have made it into the top 10, with Ilford in the east London borough of Redbridge in third place (28.8 per cent).

At the other end of the table, the Shetland village of Sandness has the smallest proportion of property sales accounted for by newly built properties at just 0.5 per cent.

The second lowest is Orpington in the London borough of Bromley at 2.7 per cent, closely followed by the Scottish town of Dumfries with 2.9 per cent.

Zoopla also looked at how property values have changed in areas with a higher proportion of new build housing.

The data reveals that areas which have a new build concentration of 25 per cent or more have grown in value on average by 29.7 per cent over the past five years — six per cent above the national average property price growth rate, which stands at 23.6 per cent

Regionally, the research also reveals that the highest concentration of new build homes are found in Southern England (five of the top 10) and the Midlands (three of the top 10), with only Crewe (29.6 per cent) and Middlesbrough (20.3 per cent) representing Northern England at the top of the table.

Lawrence Hall of Zoopla said: “New housing sales account for one in 10 property sales each year but this varies across the country.

“These new findings give us a useful overview of where new builds are most common around the country, outside of London.

Clearly, areas such as Milton Keynes and Crewe are benefiting from new investment by developers.

“While there is a correlation between a large proportion of new builds and higher property price growth, new homes are typically developed in areas of high demand, which has already contributed to a rise in property values.”