The World’s Most Lusted After Locations

Most of us, whether homeowners already or hoping to own a home in the near future, are guilty of perusing housing websites in the search for our dream home. Historically, when homeowners have desired a move to a location that isn’t feasible, it’s down to financial, logistical or even emotional reasons. But with rising interest rates making it harder to sell, and with remote working enabling people to live wherever they like without office-based restrictions, we wanted to discover which locations around the globe are most in demand, but the hardest to move to.

To reveal which spots are the most desired in 2022, we created a scoring system to determine the “lusted-after score” of each location featured in our study. By analysing global searches for “houses for sale in [location]” and pairing these with the number of properties currently for sale, we were able to unveil which destinations are truly the trickiest to move to at the moment, despite being lusted after.

The Top 20 Most Lusted After Locations in England

England is certainly not short of quaint areas that many of us would love to move to. In first place as the country’s most desired location is Malton, a picturesque town nestled in Yorkshire that earns its stripes as one of the UK’s top foodie destinations.

Malton had a lusted-after score of 78% thanks to average annual searches for properties in the area exceeding 64,000, with only a small handful of properties on the market currently.

Following in second and third place is Colchester, the former capital of Roman Britain, and Penrith, a historic market town within the Lake District surrounded by the rolling hills of the Pennines, with both in-demand locations scoring 72%.

Other notable spots which made England’s top ten most lusted after locations include Lyndhurst, a town in the New Forest brimming with tea rooms and pubs, which scored 70%, and Alnwick - a Northumberland town which is home to Alnwick Castle, the filming location for the iconic Harry Potter movies and Downton Abbey.

The Top 10 Most Lusted After Locations in Wales

The most lusted after location in Wales is none other than Llanelli, otherwise referred to as the crossroads of Wales and home to the spectacular Millennium Coastal Path. It had a lusted after score of 79% and searches for properties in the area reached almost 180,000 a year.

Carmarthen, a town situated in the same county as Llanelli, ranked in second spot, with a lusted-after score of 75%. The Welsh name for Carmarthen literally translates to Merlin’s Fort and is famously known to be the home of Merlin the Magician.

Wrapping up Wales’ top three most lusted after locations is Abergavenny, a market town in Monmouthshire that offers itself as the ideal spot to explore the Brecon Beacons from and scored 67% in our study.

The Welsh top ten is completed by other highly coveted locations scoring over 60%, including Brecon (another destination from which to explore the breath-taking Brecon Beacons), Merthyr Tydfil, a quaint town rich with history, and Haverfordwest, an ancient county town with a magnificent castle that sits overlooking the River Cleddau.

The Top 10 Most Lusted After Locations in Scotland

When it comes to Scotland, Uddingston ranks incredibly highly as a lusted after location with a massive score of 82%. A small town in South Lanarkshire, Uddingston is home to Tunnock’s factory, which is famous for its tea cakes and caramel wafers. The factory is open to visitors but is often fully booked for tours up to a year in advance!

Completing the top three most lusted after spots in Scotland with scores of 81% and 77% respectively are Falkirk, an area bursting with activities like the art deco Hippodrome Casino - the oldest of its kind in Scotland - and Clydebank, a pivotal part of Scotland’s shipbuilding history that offers an abundance of history and heritage.

Other Scottish locations deemed to be highly desirable in our study include Dumfries, a sweet market town and the home of Peter Pan author JM Barri, and St Andrews, a university town bursting with history, culture and an assortment of stunning beaches.

The Top 10 Must Lusted After Locations in Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland scored more highly than any other country in the UK, with more lusted after locations than Scotland, England and Wales.

In first position as the most highly lusted after spot in the entirety of the UK, is Newry, with a score of 92% - one of the highest scoring locations in the whole study. An eccentric city, Newry is nestled in amongst the Mourne Mountains and the Ring of Gullion and sits just next to the territory in which Game of Thrones filmed some of their spectacular scenes.

Completing the top three is Lisburn (89%), a gorgeous city that’s famed for its 400 years of producing Irish linen that was used on the Titanic, and Belfast (88%), the country’s capital city with almost 120,000 searches a year.

Completing the top ten Northern Irish lusted after locations are a number of other stunning spots; including Coleraine, the gateway to Northern Ireland’s only UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Giant’s Causeway, and Antrim, a quaint town full of castles that’s also made its name as a filming location over the years.

The Top 25 Most Lusted After Capital Cities Around The Globe

The world’s capital cities are iconic, from Paris in France, to Buenos Aires in Argentina - but which are the cream of the crop when it comes to how desirable they are and how many properties are on offer?

Perhaps surprisingly, Hamilton in Bermuda pulls rank and is the number one most lusted after capital city worldwide. The cultural and commercial hub of the tropical island, Hamilton scored a lusted after score of 94%.

The top three is completed by the vibrant metropolis Seoul in South Korea, which scored 82% in our study, and Monaco, the luxurious sovereign state that lies on the French riviera, and where over thirty per cent of its population are millionaires.

Other notable capital cities that made the rankings include tropical paradises, from Bridgetown in Barbados to Nassau in the Bahamas. San Marino, another microstate, also made the top ranks, as well as buzzing European capitals, from Sweden’s Stockholm to Germany’s Berlin.

Over 50% of the top 25 most lusted after locations were located in Europe, despite the rest of the rankings consisting of a variety of locations all around the globe, including Asia, Africa and North America.

The Top 10 Most Lusted After Capital Cities in the USA

We looked at which state’s capital city was the most highly desired on American soil, and it turns out Springfield in Illinois is the trickiest location to move to, with a lusted after score of 75%. With more searches per year than properties available, Springfield which boasts charm and culture and the iconic Route 66, is the most highly desired capital in the states.

Rounding out the top three is Boston in Massachusetts, and Richmond in Virginia, with both scoring 73%.

Other capital cities included in the top ten most lusted after included Albany (considered one of the nicest places to live in New York) and Sacramento) known as America’s Farm-to-Fork Capital and a real home for foodies).

If this has sparked some dream home hunting of your own, take a look at our online guides to find out how much it might cost you to sell your current home and what questions you might want to ask your estate agent when buying your next one - happy house hunting!

Methodology

Data was collected using Google Keyword Planner, collating annual and global search volumes for “houses for sale in [location]”, for towns and cities across the UK, capital cities across the globe, and the capital city of each state in America.

We then collated the number of properties available for sale in each of those locations using Rightmove for UK cities, and the equivalent property sites for global cities, and assigned a score to each destination in each category (UK towns and cities, US capital cities, global capital cities). Each city was given two scores based on our two main metrics - the number of searches for properties in that area, and the number of properties currently on the market. When scoring on searches, locations with the highest numbers of searches were given highest marks (eg. A score of 50 if looking at 50 locations). Each location was then scored a second time on the number of properties available, with those with the least properties available also being scored highest marks possible (eg. A score of 50 if looking at 50 locations). The two scores were then added together (eg. Giving a score out of 100 for each location), allowing us to rank the cities and towns in each category by the most to least lusted after.

Finally, location scores in each category were turned into percentage scores for consistency, and ranked according to which ones are the most lusted after, i.e. have the highest number of individuals searching for them but have the least properties available to move to. Locations which had the same name as other cities elsewhere in the world were excluded for consistency purposes.

Data correct as of October 2022.