London property prices are racing away from the rest of the country at such speed that an hour-long train journey to the office saves workers in the capital an average of £380,000 on the price of a home.
Moving to one of 21 towns within an hour's commute of London can cut the cost of buying a property to an average of £260,000, according to research by Lloyds Banking Group, compared with £641,000 in London transport zones 1 and 2. That price difference more than offsets the typical £5,000-a-year cost of a season ticket.
The most cost-effective commuter town is Wellingborough in Northamptonshire, where homes sell for an average of £150,000 – the price of a studio flat on Holloway Road in north London or a garage in Knightsbridge. The town is 45 minutes from St Pancras on East Midlands Trains, at a cost of £6,548 a year, and boasts good road links for workers who want to get to work by car.
Researchers looked at Land Registry house prices to calculate the average cost of a home in towns with good train links to the capital, and then compared them with the average property values in central London (PDF).
They found that even a 30-minute commute can result in a big cash saving on the cost of buying a home. The average cost of property in 16 towns in the half-hour commuter belt – including Reading, Luton and Hatfield – was £283,000, or £358,000 less than in central London.
When Lloyds last did the survey in the autumn of 2012, the savings from living an hour outside London were £308,000, but since then London prices have accelerated rapidly. New data from Nationwide building society last week showed London prices have soared 26% in the past year.
Commuters travelling in from outside the capital also pay substantially less than Londoners living in zones 3-6, which include areas such as Ealing, Brent Cross, West Ham and Wimbledon. A half-hour train journey means an average home will cost 28% less – some £110,000 – than the £394,000 average in outer London.
Several years ago Wellingborough and surrounding towns resisted the local development agency's bid to rebrand it North Londonshire but local estate agent Jenny Pendered said she made the most of its good transport links when marketing properties. "We sell to a lot of commuters – we make a feature of it in our brochures that we are only 50 minutes on the train from St Pancras," she said.
For £150,000 in Wellingborough, she said, buyers could get a detached three-bedroom property or a semi-detached new-build. "Typically Victorian terraces go for between £90,000 and £125,000 depending on their condition – that's what you get near the station."
Andrew Wright, area manager at another local estate agent, William H Brown, said: "You can see a steady stream of people going to the station every morning." Wright said he had recently shown a family moving from London around a four-bedroom house with a paddock, on sale for £375,000. "Northamptonshire has a history as a shoemaking area. I think it's still cheap because it has a blue-collar rather than a blue-chip heritage."
Selling up in the capital to cash in on a Wellingborough bargain home, however, doesn't appeal to all. Another agent said the town "doesn't offer a lot in terms of glamour" and that prospective buyers who look round often decide to live elsewhere.
However, Wright says investment is coming to the area, with the planned redevelopment of the station among improvements that might attract more people.
Kettering, Peterborough, Luton and Basildon are also in the top five most cost-effective towns within a 70-minute commute to central London. In each of these towns the cost of an average home was less than £174,000.
Marc Page, mortgages director at Lloyds, said: "It's no surprise, for London at least, that the further you commute, the more you save financially – even after travelling costs. However, quality of life is just as important a consideration for most and therefore trade-offs between type of property, schools, environment and time spent commuting all need to be weighed up carefully."