2025-12-25 12:00
publication
2025-12-25 12:00
Beatles John Lennon and Sir Ringo Starr, singers Sir Elton John and Sir Tomas Jones, and athletes Sue Backer and Jenson Button chose this British city. Weybridge in Surrey is running dry due to the Labor Party's tax ax on the rich. The only ones who come are the Russian oligarchs. This is how the image of the city, which was recently valued at billions of pounds, is changing.
As many as a quarter of the houses in the exclusive St. George's Hill stands empty, although it is only 23 km from the borders of London. Cracked facades, empty driveways, overgrown gardens… Temporary wooden gates locked with padlocks and chains have been erected at the entrances to the estate, suggesting that the owners have been gone for a long time. In other houses, you can see at first glance that although they are not so barricaded, no one has taken care of their surroundings for a long time. Rightmove has recently added as many as 30 properties for sale.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves revealed the plans annual tax of up to PLN 7.5 thousand pounds that would be paid by owners of properties worth over £2 million. To this you need to add taxes:
- from second homes,
- from inheritance (all assets, even those located outside the Isles, are to be subject to a levy levied by the British treasury),
- from the estate.
As a result, wealthy owners decided to sell their residences to escape the new tribute. So far, despite attractive prices, there are no interested parties. And the discounts are truly spectacular: because the residence was valued at 3.7 million pounds before the holidays, it does not want to sell for 2.
This does not stop the richest from leaving and “abandoning” their homes. This also affects people employed in services. One of those who left is billionaire Lakshmi Mittal, a former Labor Party adviser. His and his family's fortune is estimated at £14.9 billion, which last year placed him 7th on the list of the richest people in Great Britain. The Indian-born steel tycoon spends most of his time in Dubai and is registered as a Swiss resident for tax purposes. Similar trips have already been decided by, among others, Revolut CEO Nikolay Storonsky and Nassef Sawiris, Egyptian co-owner of Aston Villa FC football club.
I would compare the situation to the Lehman Brothers meltdown in 2008. Those were terrible times and now I see the same thing happening, confesses James Constantinou, the owner of a pawn shop in the Daily Mail.
“So I would say it's just as bad, maybe even worse, because it affects very wealthy, super-rich people who leave, and that in turn affects the average person on the street who no longer has customers to provide services to, whether they are a gardener, a cleaner or whatever,” he adds.
This also translates into the sale of assets. As he points out, his company has already accepted works of art and other things that cannot be taken with you. Such as license plates. Some of his clients paid between PLN 50,000 and PLN 60,000 for them. pounds. Now they sell them for 5 or 10 thousand.
So far, the Labor Party's ideas have not been able to scare Russian property owners. These include approximately 250 residences, located in the city itself and in the immediate vicinity. There are even rumors that Maria Faassen, the eldest daughter of President Vladimir Putin, owns a house here. Although the oligarchs want to take their money from the Kremlin banks, they have no intention of giving it directly to the London treasury in the form of taxes. Hence, some of the houses owned by Russians will probably go up for sale this year.
Here he wrote hits for the Beatles
Among the properties for sale is John Lennon's residence called Kenwood, which he bought in 1964 for PLN 20,000. pounds. In the attic there he wrote songs such as: “I AM The Walrus”, “Day Tripper”, “Ticket To Ride” and “In My Life”.
After four years, he sold the six-room house for twice as much, i.e. PLN 40,000. pounds.
In 2020, the house was put up for sale again for £8.95 million.
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