The market goes ‘ballistic’ as the Notting Hill set decamps to Somerset

Demand for homes in Somerset’s pretty market towns is booming. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Bruton, a town of about 3,000 people located a few miles from the Glastonbury festival site. The number of property sales in the 12 months to March was 122 per cent higher than the year before, the biggest increase of any country location in the UK, according to portal Rightmove.

At a little under £366,000, the town’s average asking price is now 19 per cent higher than it was before the pandemic.

In recent years, Bruton has become a byword for rural gentrification. The town is home to the Hauser & Wirth art gallery — branches of which can also be found in places such as New York, LA and Zurich — the Newt, a luxury hotel and spa owned by South African billionaire Koos Bekker, and, since last summer, former chancellor George Osborne, who spent £1.6m on a Grade-II listed, five-bedroom Georgian house near the high street.

Other high-profile residents in this part of Somerset include fashion designer Stella McCartney and theatre producer Cameron Mackintosh.

But the transformation has not been to everyone’s taste. “Bruton is a very nice place to spend the day, but it does feel slightly artificial now, like the Notting Hill set’s idea of the countryside,” says Andy Couling, an architect who has lived half an hour away in Hinton Charterhouse, near Bath, for 40 years.

Richard G Mitchell, an Ivor Novello-winning composer of music for TV and films, has lived in Batcombe, a village about three miles from the centre of Bruton, for 22 years. He says his “big mistake” was in selling his detached five-bedroom house for £1m last summer to downsize locally.

“We have been renting until we can find a new place and almost a year later, we can no longer afford what we want due to the tsunami from London, often buying houses that are only second homes,” he says. “The attitude of this new generation of DFLs (Down from Londoners) is out of step with the community and the area no longer has the charm it once had.”

Estate agents, nevertheless, are rubbing their hands. Lockdown — and the demise (at least for now) of the daily commute — has fuelled demand among wealthy Londoners for Bruton property, ranging from small character cottages from about £250,000 to larger country houses just outside the town for £2m, says Sue Macey at Lodestone Property, an estate agency.

“Londoners like the creative vibe of the high street,” she says, listing the Michelin-starred Osip restaurant, run by chef Merlin Labron-Johson, and The Old Pharmacy deli as popular attractions. “And commuting is easy, if you only have to go into the City office two or three times a week,” she adds. Any more than that would be a struggle, though — the train journey to Paddington takes over two hours.

Frome, a town about 10 miles north-east of Bruton, has also become increasingly popular with relocating buyers — and has been gentrifying rapidly. “I remember Frome in the 1990s when it was a dire, dumpy town. Now it’s as popular as Bruton,” says Amanda Sharpe, a PR company director who recently moved to the town from Hampshire.

The average property price in Frome has risen 13 per cent in the 12 months to March to £341,850, according to Land Registry data analysed by Hamptons.

Agents say demand in the most sought-after areas of Somerset is at an all-time high. “Since the pandemic, the market has gone ballistic,” says Anthony Pears from Jackson-Stops, who reports that across the county, buyers outnumber sellers by 14 to 1.

Unlike in the Surrey or Hampshire markets, lack of stock is an issue — mainly, thinks Robin Gould at Prime Purchase buying agency, because sellers are scared there is nowhere to go. “It’s not a commuting population that moves around a lot. People tend to move there and stay for 20-25 years, so it is a very different mindset,” he says.

New arrivals in Somerset, though, are happy to widen their search areas, including to towns on the border of Somerset and Dorset, such as Sandford Orcas and Corton Denham. “These slightly more rural locations were once reserved for entrepreneur types who only needed to go to London once or twice a week, but now most people fit this mould,” says Pears.

Being near the coast is a big draw for families too, he adds — and not just the Dorset coast, but the more unsung Somerset coast, which is about more than donkey rides in Weston-super-Mare or the smart Victorian town houses in Clevedon, a popular spot because of its proximity to Bristol, 13 miles away.

In the Sedgemoor area — which takes in the market town of Bridgwater and a coastal stretch including Berrow Beach and Burnham-on-Sea — Savills reports a 66 per cent rise in agreed sales so far this year, compared with the same period in 2019 — the highest rise of any local authority in Somerset.

The influx of property buyers doubtless brings a new life and wealth to these rural economies. “The Newt has given the local economy a boost just where it needed it: the dairy farmers, cheesemakers and local crafts businesses. These places encourage people to put down roots,” says architect Richard Parr, who has designed the hotel’s new accommodation offering called The Farmyard.

But many locals feel uprooted. “The wonderful rural community we discovered when we moved here now really struggles with the ridiculous house prices and many have finally been squeezed out,” says Mitchell. As has he; he’s off to a tiny hamlet in Devon where he hopes to find the Somerset he once loved.

What you can buy for….

New-build house, Bruton, £599,000

A four-bedroom house in Cubis Bruton, a new, energy-efficient development of 56 three and four-bedroom houses overlooking the town of Bruton. This house has three bathrooms and two reception rooms. Available through Lodestone Property.

Manor house, Porlock, £1m

A seven-bedroom, Georgian-style manor house in Porlock, near the north Somerset coast. The property, which has four reception rooms and measures 3,798 sq ft, is available through Savills.

Farmhouse, Evercreech, £1.15m

A four-bedroom Georgian farmhouse with a two-bedroom barn conversion in Evercreech, between Bruton and Shepton Mallet. The property, which comes with about two acres of grounds, is available through estate agency Greenslade Taylor Hunt.

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