Milton Keynes best '˜new town' for house price growth

New towns generally have seen house prices increase by nearly a third (32 per cent) over the past 10 years.

Halifax said that since 1986, property prices in Milton Keynes have surged by 601 per cent to reach £309,415 on average.

This makes it Britain’s top-performing new town over the past three decades.

New towns were created in waves after the Second World War, generally emerging between the 1940s and 1960s and helping to alleviate housing shortages following the war.

Halifax, which used its own database, examined the house price performance of 26 of new towns to mark the milestone birthday of Milton Keynes.

Martin Ellis, a housing economist at Halifax, said: “Milton Keynes has been the best-performing of all the new towns created following the Second World War in terms of house price performance since 1986.

“Many of these new towns are within easy commuting distance of major commercial centres, where property is typically more expensive, particularly in the South East, where the average property price is well below that in London.

“This makes them a highly popular choice with home buyers, explaining their relatively good house price performance, and this popularity has been particularly notable during the last decade.”