London's Kensington, Chelsea lead in the mln pound house race

The number of houses sold in Britain for one million pounds (1.41 million U.S. dollars) or more during 2015 was 70 times the level recorded in 1995, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) reported Thursday.

But even though 13,679 properties went for that seven digit price tag, it was fewer than in 2014 when 14,431 million-pound homes were sold.

ONS said following the 2014 peak, last year's fall coincides with the introduction of new stamp duty rules which saw tax on properties increasing to at least ten percent of the amount paid over 925,000 pounds, up from the previous five percent maximum.

The majority of one million pound property sales were in London's fashionable and expensive Kensington and Chelsea areas.

In Kensington and Chelsea, one million pounds or more was paid for 57 percent of all properties sold in the year ending September 2015.

This part of London is the only part of England and Wales where the number of million pound properties sold was more than half of all sales. London's Westminster had the second highest proportion of sales of one million pounds or more properties, at 42 percent.

The highest proportion of properties at a million pounds or more outside of London was in Elmbridge, Surrey. There the price paid for properties exceeded one million pounds for 16 percent of sales in the year ending September 2015.

ONS said newly-built property was now just as likely as an existing property to sell for one million pounds or more in the year ending September 2015. This marks a large change from five years ago, when new properties were less than half as likely to sell for over one million pounds as existing properties. (1 pound = 1.41 U.S. dollars) Endit