Value of UK leaps 9% to record high of £10trillion

BRITAIN has been valued at nearly £10trillion – equivalent to £150,000 for every person in the country.

Landowners were the biggest winners as the net worth of the UK rose by a record £803billion last year and now sit on a fortune of £5trillion. In percentage terms, the 8.9 per cent increase was the biggest in the UK’s value since 2004, the Office for National Statistics said.

Land, Britain’s most valuable asset, has soared by £280billion in the last 12 months and makes up more than half our total net worth of £9.8trillion.

It has shot up in value over the past 20 years, rising by 412 per cent since 1995 – nearly double the rate of other assets which have increased by 211 per cent, the ONS report said.

This is despite a tumble of 23 per cent – or £913billion – in land value following the financial crisis in 2008

But it has since bounced back and is now at a record high.

The ONS report measures how much assets in the UK would sell for on the open market and are made up of everything from land, housing and other buildings or infrastructure to public debt, equipment and weapons systems.

The nation’s housing stock was valued at nearly £1.8trillion at the end of 2016, up 3.4 per cent on the previous year and double its value in 2002. The net value of the UK has risen for four consecutive years as the economic growth picked up following the recession.

Daniel Groves, a statistician at the ONS, said: ‘Since 1995 the value of land has increased more than fivefold, making it our most valuable asset.

‘At £5trillion, it accounts for just over half of the total net worth of the UK. At over £800billion, the rise in the nation’s total net worth is the largest annual increase on record.’