That regional picture has shifted. The North East’s share of sales in negative equity has dropped by more than half over the past decade, from 29.9% in 2019 to 17.7% in 2024 and 13.9% in 2025. London has moved in the opposite direction, underscoring a reversal in relative performance between North and South.
The capital’s trend has been driven by flats. Although flats made up 60% of London transactions in 2025, they accounted for 90% of homes sold at a loss, up from 78.4% in 2019. At local authority level, eight of the 10 areas with the highest share of loss-making sales were in London.
Tower Hamlets recorded the largest proportion of loss-making vendors nationally in 2025, with 28.2% of sellers achieving less than they originally paid. Flats represent more than nine in 10 sales in the borough. The City of London (26.2%), Kensington & Chelsea (22.4%), Westminster (22.1%) and Hammersmith & Fulham (20.8%) completed the top five local authorities where more than a fifth of sellers sold at a loss. By contrast, in Barking & Dagenham, the capital’s lowest-priced borough on average, only 5.3% of sellers took a loss.
Despite the rising incidence of loss-making sales, most London vendors still achieved substantial nominal gains. The average seller in the capital in 2025 realised £172,510 more than they paid, equivalent to a 44.6% increase. Much of this uplift reflects longer-term price growth rather than recent performance. Around half of London households who sold last year had owned their property for more than 10 years; in cash terms, these long-term owners accounted for 77% of total gains in the capital.
Houses outperformed flats. London house sellers achieved an average gain of 59.6% over a typical holding period of 10.3 years, compared with 35.4% for flat owners over an average of 10.1 years. Only 3.5% of house vendors in the capital sold at a loss, versus 22.2% of flat sellers. That gap has widened, making it harder for flat owners to step up to a house.