Beyond the headlines, this has been a year of emerging property trends: a rise in “Birdnesting” amongst divorced couples, families embracing apartment living and “propfluencers” shaking up the capital’s property scene.
From rental reform to new airspace developments, here are some of the year’s biggest property stories.
The Chancellor announced her first budget in October
Jordan Pettitt/PA
In her first Budget on 30 October, Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced a number of changes to stamp duty. This included a toughened stance on second home purchases: anyone buying an additional property —either a second home or a buy-to-let— must pay a five per cent surcharge.
Stamp duty thresholds will also revert to their previous levels from 31 March 2025 onwards. For first-time buyers, the threshold has dropped from £425,000 to £300,000 and from £250,000 to £125,000 for buyers who have purchased a home before.
Campaigning organisations like the National Leasehold Campaign (pictured) have long been calling for leasehold reform
Shutterstock / Frank 2012
In May, the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 passed into law ahead of the general election. This aimed to strengthen leaseholders’ rights, including provisions such changing the qualifying criteria for leaseholders to extend their lease, improving transparency around service charges and increasing the standard lease extension term to 990 years, with ground rent reduced to a peppercorn upon payment of a premium.
However, without a cap on ground rent or the prevention of forfeiture, campaigners called this a “muted win for leaseholders”. “While the legislation is not without merit, leaseholders must see it as a step in a journey rather than the destination itself,” said Linz Darlington, MD of leasehold extension specialists Homehold.
The Renters’ Rights Bill will abolish Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions
Shutterstock / Slava Dumchev
In January, Homes & Property told the story of a woman who was served a section 21 eviction notice by her landlord after chasing for promised repairs and contesting a rent rise. Unable to contact her landlord —the address on her tenancy was not a business premises but another tenant’s home— she called Citizen’s Advice, who explained that her situation was so common that there was little recourse.
Rental reform was first brought to parliament under the Conservative government in May 2023, but was dropped before this year’s general election. The Labour government’s new Renters’ Rights Bill had its first reading in September and is currently in its report stage in the House of Commons. The new legislation promises to abolish section 21 no-fault evictions and introduces more detailed grounds for possession for landlords to recover their properties as well as safeguards for tenants.
Donald Trump was elected in November
AP
In November, Donald Trump won the US presidential election, raising the question: how will this impact London’s property market?
Overnight, high-end estate agents reported a surge in calls, with anti-Trump Americans looking for trophy homes to rent. “My team have been up most of the night fielding enquiries from many of the US cities that we work with, including New York and Los Angeles,” said Becky Fatemi of Sotheby’s International Realty after the election. “The most immediate requests are for rentals. They want wide-fronted townhouses in Notting Hill or large lateral apartments in buildings with a porter, such as the Peninsula. We expect to see this demand continue.”
Other high-end agents believe that this interest will lead to sales, boosting the UK market. US buyers have been shopping for properties in London all year, driven not just by the election but by the strength of the dollar against the pound, falling prices in prime central London and the British education system. “An influx of Americans buying up homes with create a swing in sentiment and momentum and could move prices up too,” said James Gow, head of London residential sales for Strutt & Parker. “A Trump win could be good for the London market.”
The families languishing in Acton’s unsafe shipping container estate
Meath Court was installed as temporary accommodation in 2017
Daniel Hambury/Stella Pictures Ltd
Earlier this year, seven current and former residents filed a claim against Ealing council, who pledged to relocate all residents from Meath Court by the end of January this year. But by March, only 33 of 60 had been moved. “The shipping containers at Meath Court are not fit for human habitation,” said Eleanor Solomon, partner at Anthony Gold Solicitors, which is representing the residents. “They are too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter, mouldy due to poor insulation and leaks and the estate as a whole is not safe.”
One resident, who fled an abusive partner with her children, told Homes & Property that the laundry rooms had been turned into brothels, there was defecation in the washing machines and that she was robbed as she entered her apartment. The resident claimed to have witnessed a woman visiting the estate be thrown from the fourth floor onto the concrete below.
“We have put our hands up and we are moving people as quickly as possible,” said Councillor Bassam Mahfouz.
Farhana and her sons at their home in Tonbridge
Matt Writtle
With 42 per cent of marriages now ending in divorce, “Birdnesting” — when a separated couple maintains one family home and another smaller house or flat, which they can swap into when it’s not their turn with the children — became increasingly popular with affluent parents wanting to minimise the disruption of a split.
Following her divorce, for example, Farhana Hussain lives with her three teenage sons in the family house in Tonbridge, Kent, while her ex-husband lives in a studio nearby. “He comes and goes throughout the week and makes himself dinner and has dinner with us once a week,” she said. “One or two weekends a month, he comes and spends the weekend here and I’ll go off somewhere else. He has keys and lets himself in, makes himself at home and makes himself food.”
“Five years ago, nesting was seen as really ‘out there’ and judges discouraged it, as they wanted the divorce to be a clean break, but it’s now more common,” said family law barrister Samantha Woodham, who helps clients consider Birdnesting. “It’s got to be bilateral.”
Inside Highgate’s unsold mega-mansion
Heathfield House was listed for sale in 2019
Robert Irving Burns/Rightmove
Heathfield House is a futuristic, 18,239 square foot property in Highgate. It was built from scratch by its owner, a Russian-born businessman who purchased the land and demolished the vacant property that stood on it, intending to “make an architectural statement”, according to Trevor Abrahmsohn of Glentree Estates. The property was first listed for £40 million in 2019 with Lee Koffman —then at Sotheby’s International Realty, now with Robert Irving Burns— and remains on the market five years later, now with an £8 million price reduction.
“It’s a very unique house. It cost (the owner) a fortune to do it, with the materials he used: the fantastic marble and onyx; the glass lift. But it is quite specific to his tastes,” said Koffman. “It’s the appetite for doing the work, or getting the planning, or whatever it is they want to do. We’re looking for a niche buyer that loves a contemporary, almost James Bond-look house, and will pay good money for it.”
Koffman has had offers on the house, but none have materialised in a sale. And the owner, ultimately, is in no rush. “At this price point, you can’t really put a timer on it,” says Koffman. “It sells when it sells.”
Families embracing apartment living
Anna and Pete Austin have chosen a small Chelsea flat over a house in the suburbs
Juliet Murphy
As part of a wider return to central London post-pandemic, this year saw some families eschew a house in the suburbs in favour of a centrally located flat. Anna and Pete Austin, for example, bought and renovated their Chelsea apartment in 2020, prioritising proximity to nearby cultural attractions over space – even though it means renting out a storage unit in Croydon and packing up the flat after their daughter goes to bed. “My husband and I joke that we live in the smallest flat in Chelsea,” said Anna. “We’d rather live in a tiny flat in central London than a house anywhere else.”
In order to escape the cost and energy required to maintain a large house, Clio Wood and her husband Bryn Snelson were also contemplating a move from their four-bedroom house in Forest Gate to a central London apartment. “The bills aren’t getting any cheaper and fuel costs are going up. There’s a pressure on us mentally… These issues don’t disappear with a flat, but it would be better than it is now.”
Rooftop extensions on the rise
50 Oakley Square in Camden is a pioneering airspace development
Pierce Scourfield
While airspace projects are often complex, prompting resistance from neighbouring residents, a new Camden airspace development, 50 Oakley Square, provides an interesting blueprint for future development. There, a group of apartment owners struck a deal with architect-developer Echlin Studio: they would have their roof fixed and communal areas improved, while Echlin could build eight flats on top of the apartment block. All apartments in the development have now sold.
“The planning process was tough as there was initial resistance to a two-storey scheme. The strategy was to go for one storey (which was obtained) and then having established the principle of rooftop development being acceptable, we submitted a two-storey application,” said Mark O’Callaghan of Echlin. “London contains many buildings that could be suitable, especially given the importance of retaining real estate rather than demolishing and rebuilding to reduce carbon emissions and considering the city’s housing crisis.”
The propfluencers taking over London’s property scene
Toby Corban started his own agency in 2019
Juliet Murphy
As the world of estate agency has changed over the past few years —fewer high street agencies, more self-employed agents, and a shift in the way properties are marketed online— it has given rise to a new breed of entrepreneurial, ambitious property influencers with vast online followings. These include Summer Newman and Matt Mellor of The Luxury Home Show; Toby Corban, who started his own estate agency, Corban Group, in 2019; and Jade Vanriel, who has been talking about property on her YouTube channel since 2015.
Having an online presence is key to building relationships and generating clients, London’s propfluencers say. “We’re moving into an era where if you grow your personal brand and showcase aspects of your life, people will follow your journey and want to work with you, before even meeting you in person,” said Newman. “They feel like, through social media, they’ve already got to know you.”
“We’re selling to our own peers. I believe that’s why the industry is doing well,” Vanriel agreed. “We know how to speak to our audiences online, what people are looking for, what’s important… It’s amazing to see such a change in such a short space of time.”