Demand surges for Britain’s country estates

The once-slumping market for England’s most elaborate and expensive country estates has been surging in recent months.

At least 19 country estates have sold for more $20 million — 15 million pounds — compared to just one above that price last year and just five in 2018, according to Bloomberg.

That type of high-maintenance property tended to linger on the market in years past. That was also true for estates priced between $2.5 million and $13 million.

“The marketplace for country houses last hit its highest in 2007, early 2008 — and then, that summer and autumn, there was a crash,” Savills’ Crispin Holborow told Bloomberg. “Ever since then, the country market has been limping along.”

Now, people with the money to afford a second and third home are looking to the palatial 18th century estates, with their thousand-plus acres of land.

Pricing is up 2.3 percent in the last year, and deal volume is also up. In a six-week period ending in late June, the number of accepted deals for properties between $6.5 million and $13 million was 182 percent above the five-year average. [Bloomberg] — Dennis Lynch