The UK’s expanding tech industry has pushed up house prices significantly in its main hubs, including Cambridge, Oxford and the Silicon Roundabout area of London.
The price of property has surged in these areas over the past five years, according to data from the Office for National Statistics and Tech City UK, despite a 4.3 percent slowdown in 2016. In Cambridge, where 15 in 1,000 people are employed by the tech industry, house prices have soared 58.7 per cent to reach £442,518.
In the South West, Reading and Oxford have seen a strong increase after a surge in tech companies moved to take advantage of its position near London and on the M4 Corridor. Prices in Reading have risen 60 per cent to £307,718, 49.7 per cent to £415,484 in Oxford.
The area seeing the biggest jump in prices has, unsurprisingly, been London’s tech hub Old Street. Prices around the ‘silicon roundabout’ have risen 75.5 per cent since 2011 to reach £541,914.
Daniel Gandesha, chief executive of crowdfunding platform Property Partner, commented: “The digital economy is expanding rapidly, creating new jobs and opportunities across the UK – but it’s not evenly spread.
“As a large-scale buyer of residential property up and down the country, we know that tech clusters drive local incomes and in turn house prices.
“Alongside key infrastructure projects and regeneration, tech clusters are changing neighbourhoods such as Deansgate in Manchester and Cambridge.
“Innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship in the tech sector is not only transforming everything we do on a daily basis but is also strengthening the British economy.”
The last five years have seen London take centre-stage in Europe’s tech scene, with government-based start-up loans and a laissez-faire approach to regulation making it one of the best places in Europe to start a tech company. London-based tech companies raised $1.6 billion in the first nine months of this year, already more than the total amount raised in 2014.