Scotland house prices: Number of properties over £1m doubles, with over half based in Edinburgh
Scotland is fast becoming a land of million-pound properties, with the number of homes selling for more than £1m doubling in the first half of this year.
Figures from the Bank of Scotland show that from January to June, 111 properties went for this value or more, compared to 43 during the first half of 2014.
Edinburgh took the crown, with 63 top-end properties selling there – 57 per cent of the total. This is triple the number of seven-figure sales made in the capital in the first half of 2014.
Read more: Scotland's growth at its highest since 2007 as prices accelerate
East Lothian had the second highest increase, with nine properties going for £1m or more. East Renfrewshire and Glasgow both had the third highest increase, with four sales each compared to none in 2014.
Scotland's house prices have risen disproportionately fast compared to the UK as a whole, which experienced an 11 per cent fall in sales of £1m or more compared to last year.
Nitesh Patel, economist at Bank of Scotland said:
The amount of homes in Scotland that have sold for more than a million pounds has more than doubled within a year, which is a stark contract to Great Britain as a whole.
Sales south of the border may have been impacted by the new Stamp Duty rates last December; whilst the equivalent Land and Building Transaction Tax came into force for Scottish homebuyers only in April.
However, the number of million-pound property sales in Scotland still pales in comparison to some parts of England, such as London where there were 3,703 in the first half of the year, and the South East, where there were 1,037.