More than 2,000 Londoners own second home in Brighton and Hove

Brighton and Hove is the second most popular town or city for Londoners to own second homes.

Only Chichester is more popular, according to a combination of 2011 Census data and research by the estate agency Hamptons International.

The figures were published in the Sunday Times yesterday (Sunday 2 November).

They newspaper said that 2,348 Londoners own second homes in Brighton and Hove, compared with 2,714 in Chichester.

It also said that the counties of Wiltshire included 3,629 second homes owned by Londoners while the figure for Cornwall and the Scilly Isles was 3,314.

The Sunday Times report, in the newspapers Home supplement, quoted Marc Cox, of estate agents Mishon Mackay, saying: “Prices have gone up 20 per cent in the past year and demand from non-residents means we’re now seeing one-bed flats going for £200,000.

“We recently sold a three-bedroom terraced house next to Hove Station for nearly £500,000. Twenty years ago it would have sold for £35,000.”

By contrast the Brighton and Hove City Council website carries an analysis of the 2011 Census that indicates a slightly different picture.

It said: “In total there are 118,953 household spaces in Brighton and Hove, 114,479 have residents living in them, the remaining are either vacant (3,571 household spaces or 3 per cent of all household spaces) or are second or holiday homes (903 household spaces or 0.8 per cent of all household spaces).

“This is broadly similar proportionately to the south east and England and Wales average.

“In 1991 a higher percentage of household spaces were vacant in Brighton and Hove (7 per cent) and 2 per cent were not primary residences.”