Where to live in Liverpool
While the Capital of Culture is promising to have all sorts of amazing effects on Liverpool’s fortunes, one area where it has certainly had an effect is on the city’s house prices, which shot up by an average of 20% in the year after the award was announced, while some inner city areas have seen prices double.
This rise, however, was from a low base and house prices will have to grow by 20% again if they are to match those in Manchester.
One frequently mentioned aspect of Merseyside is its lack of traffic congestion, which means that the range of places to live is potentially much broader than other cities and consequently, unlike Manchester perhaps, there is no “professional ghetto”. The choice is vast – warehouse conversions and Georgian terraces in the city centre, elegant Victorian villas in the swisher suburbs, country living in Cheshire or by the seaside at the end of the Wirral or northwards up the coast towards Southport.
Liverpool city centre's population has more than tripled in the last 10 years and is forecast to double again in the next 5 years as new developments and conversions spring up all the over the middle of town and along the waterfront, plans for which include a 30-storey residential skyscraper, Beetham Tower, due for completion at the beginning of 2005. An apartment in the new tower will set you back between £200,000-£400,000, depending on how high you want to go (the upper floors promise views of the Welsh mountains), although more typical 2-bed dockside apartments start at around £140,000.
The city centre is not just about converted warehouses however. The ‘Cultural Quarter’ between the two cathedrals is composed of a series of elegant Georgian streets and squares, once home to the merchants that made Liverpool the commercial powerhouse it was in the 19th century.
The better suburban areas, meanwhile, tend to be to the south of the city. Woolton, arguably the most desirable suburban area, sees the biggest detached houses change hands for close to the £1m mark, smaller detached house are in the £300-£400,000 price range. Nearby Allerton and Grassendale are a little cheaper, while a little further into town, the Mossley Hill (which takes in the famous Penny Lane) conservation area offers detached houses from £350,000 and Victorian terraces from £150,000. Assuming the national property market stays strong, prices in these areas seem likely to rise further as the city council has placed a moratorium on new housing developments in the better-off districts as it tries to encourage the regeneration of the inner city.
The same applies on the other side of the Mersey, on the Wirral peninsula, where in the most desirable areas to the west, such as the coastal districts of Hoylake, West Kirby and Heswall, detached houses can reach £750,000. Equally desirable, and more expensive, are the seaside towns to the north of Liverpool – Birkdale and Ainsdale in Southport, Blundellsands and Formby on Merseyside’s ‘Golf coast’.
Also popular amongst Liverpool lawyers is Chester, which at less than 20 miles from the Liverpool city centre, is comfortably commutable. Chester offers a variety of (often expensive) options and has also seen an explosion of city centre apartments which start at around £250,000 for two beds.
Meanwhile, for those that see house-buying as an investment, Liverpool has a number of areas that may yet see better days. Much of Liverpool’s housing stock is Victorian, dating back to the city’s mercantile heyday when it was home to a substantial prosperous middle class. Now, some up-and-coming areas, for example Sefton Park and Wavertree, have some real architectural gems while formerly down-at-heel parts of the city such as Kensington and Croxteth are benefiting from the regeneration money being poured into Liverpool. However, ‘up-and-coming’ can be a euphemism for rough and, as Liverpool is home to some of the country’s toughest districts, as well as some of the nicest, it really is a case of ‘buyer beware’.
Liverpool (all)
| Detached |
£206,524 |
| Semi |
£124,212 |
| Terrace |
£68,961 |
| Flat |
£136,776 |
Liverpool City Centre (L1)
| Detached |
Too few sales |
| Semi |
Too few sales |
| Terrace |
Too few sales |
| Flat |
£142,430 |
Woolton (L18)
| Detached |
£266, 660 |
| Semi |
£186,456 |
| Terrace |
£129,708 |
| Flat |
£201,926 |
Wavertree (L15)
| Detached |
£178,237 |
| Semi |
£153,687 |
| Terrace |
£88,725 |
| Flat |
£103,316 |
Southport (PR8)
| Detached |
£258,337 |
| Semi |
£143,807 |
| Terrace |
£148,110 |
| Flat |
£123,440 |
Heswall (CH60, CH61, CH64)
| Detached |
£339,204 |
| Semi |
£161,458 |
| Terrace |
£206,834 |
| Flat |
£136,980 |
Chester (all)
| Detached |
£178,237 |
| Semi |
£153,687 |
| Terrace |
£105,246 |
| Flat |
£76,991 |
|
