A week after a rebound in the price of London condominium units, a rebound of 6.5% in the second quarter of the year would push the market above its all-time high.
On Wednesday, the London-based Condo Board of Trade said condo prices rose 4.5 percent in the quarter ended July 27, a month when the U.K. suffered its first recession since the 1930s.
The benchmark price of a three-bedroom, two-bathroom, three-bathrooms, two and four-bath condo in the capital rose 3.7 percent to a record high of £1.5m.
That compares with a 1.8 percent gain in London-area condos in the same period last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Demand for new condo units is still strong in the United Kingdom, which is struggling to recover from the economic crisis that followed the Brexit vote.
In April, London-listed condo units fell 9.9 percent, the most since August 2014, the first year of the so-called “Brexit cliff.”
That helped to lift the value of London-issued condominium certificates, which account for nearly all new condominium sales.
However, the value also fell sharply after the British government last year introduced stricter rules for developers to allow for an equal number of condo units for every one residential property.
London is the world’s fourth-largest housing market, and it is expected to grow at a 6.6 percent annualized rate in the next five years, according in a report by Nomura Holdings Inc. Despite its modest pace of growth, London’s condominium market remains vulnerable to the global economic slowdown, as new orders for housing are low, as well as the lack of sufficient supply.
Even as the London market is still growing, its price is still among the highest in Europe, at nearly £2.4m.