Don't believe the asking price — these London postcodes are topping the charts for big discounts

It’s always worth including homes a bit outside of your budget in your property search, as a new report from Upstix underscores.

The proptech company has crunched the numbers and found London postcodes are often where the deepest discounts from the asking price are achieved.

Across the W postcode, which covers the West End, Paddington and Marylebone, homes are selling for 6.5 per cent below the asking price, reports Upstix. NW postcodes are ranked third in the country, with homes selling for 6.4 per cent below asking price in Camden, Hampstead and Kilburn.

Bloomsbury and Holborn in the WC postcode saw homes selling for six per cent below asking price on average, while 5.8 per cent discounts were on the cards in Chelsea, Wandsworth and Clapham’s SW postcode.

Only Preston and Southport, in north west England, saw more dramatic price discounts, with homes selling for almost nine per cent below asking price. Six of the 10 postcodes with the most significant changes between listed price and the accepted offer were in London.

“Far too often people are lured by over optimistic valuations when it comes to selling their homes.”

Fred Jones, Upstix

For sellers, this underscores that over-optimistic pricing can be a barrier to a quick sale said Upstix, while buyers should take note that negotiation is always on the cards.

“Our data highlights a really important point in your home buying journey, an asking price is only ever that — the price you are asking for and not the price you actually achieve for your property,” said Fred Jones, chief operating officer at Upstix.

“Far too often people are lured by over optimistic valuations when it comes to selling their homes,” he added. “But it is often these overvaluations that cause problems such as a lack of interested buyers, long listing times leading to eventually having to reduce the asking price.”

It currently takes 61 days on average to find a buyer in London according to Rightmove, down from a peak of 84 days in November last year.

UK postcodes with the biggest asking price discounts

Rank	Postcode	Popular locations in the area	Price change from listed to sold
1	PR	Preston, Southport, Leyland	-8.9 per cent
2	W	West End, Paddington, Marylebone	-6.5 per cent
3	NW	Camden, Hampstead, Kilburn	-6.4 per cent
4	WC	Bloomsbury, Holborn, Strand	-6 per cent
5	SW	Chelsea, Wandsworth, Clapham	-5.8 per cent
6	HA	Harrow, Wembley, Ruislip	-5.5 per cent
7	TW	Twickenham, Hounslow, Teddington	-5.4 per cent
8	SL	Slough, Windsor, Maidenhead	-5.2 per cent
9	LD	Llandrindod Wells, Knighton, Presteigne	-5.2 per cent
10	BH	Bournemouth, Poole, Christchurch	- 5 per cent

Interestingly, asking prices in the boroughs covering these postcodes have risen annually, according to the latest Rightmove data, bucking London’s downward trend in asking prices.

Westminster, where the average asking price is over £1.53 million, has seen a 5.4 per cent annual uptick in asking prices, while Camden has risen 3.7 per cent, with average asking prices over £1.06 million.

London’s most expensive postcodes are currently seeing the biggest discounts as the prime central London market struggles with ongoing economic and political uncertainty.