Written on 6 April 2016 by Alistair Boscawen in Property News
Almost 25% of Mayfair’s 279 acres is now owned by investors from Qatar.
Residents from the oil-rich Gulf state now own more than 4300 homes in Mayfair worth an estimated total of £1bn.
Members of the Qatar royal family and Qatari investment funds have invested so much in London property that a new Qatari quarter has started to develop on the north-west side of Mayfair.
The exclusive area centres around £200m Dudley House on Park Lane, the London home of Sheikh Hamad bin Abdullah Al Than, the cousin of Qatar’s emir.
It also includes the former Brazilian embassy on Green Street, which is reportedly owned by Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned, the mother of current emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.
The family is also believed to own a £40m townhouse on Mount Street, a £13m home on Park Street, a £12m townhouse on Davies Street and £180m Lombard House on Curzon Street.
Hamad Khalifa Abdullah Al-Attiyah, the former Qatari Deputy Prime Minister, is also reported to have paid £24m for a house on Reeves Mews.
It is estimated that investors from Qatar account for 5% of all Mayfair property purchases each year and more than 60% of all buyers of property priced above £10m.
The emergence of the Qatari quarter is part of bigger trend of wealthy investors from the Middle East spending money on London property.
It is said that investors from Iran with assets of at least £20m will spend up to £6bn on overseas property over the next 5-10 years, with London will among their top locations.
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