Parking space near Hyde Park goes on sale for £300,000 - almost TWICE the price of an average UK home

Parking spot in London's Hyde Park Gardens measures just 11ft x 21ft

Homes in exclusive enclave cost anywhere from £1m to £15m



Price of average home sold in England and Wales is £162,000

A parking space has been put on the market for a record-breaking £300,000 - almost twice the price of the average UK home.

The spot in London's exclusive Hyde Park Gardens measures just 11ft x 12ft, but its price tag is almost double the £162,000 paid for the average house sold in England and Wales last month.



Estate agents Kay & Co, who last year sold two nearby parking spaces for £250,000 each, said several people had already expressed an interest in snapping up the six-figure spot.



Eye-watering: The 11ft x 21ft parking space in London's exclusive Hyde Park Gardens, seen left in an aerial shot and right, is on the market for £300,000



The agent said parking spaces are in hot demand in Hyde Park Gardens, where houses cost up to £15million.

Its buyer will be paying £1,299 per square foot for the privilege of owning a central space in Westminster.



Exclusive: The parking space in the millionaires' enclave costs almost twice as much as the average UK home

The 231 sq ft parking spot, which is being sold with a 91-year lease, costs £500 more than a nearby studio flat sold by the agent last week.



WHAT ELSE CAN £300,000 BUY?

Hyde Park Gardens' residents pockets may be deep enough to splash out £300,000 on a parking space without breaking a sweat.

But mere mortals might prefer to spend the six-figure sum on something a little more spacious - a five bedroom home in Leeds, perhaps. An executive five bedroom property in Rothwell complete with gardens, driveway and a detached garage is on the market for the same price as the tiny central London space. Buyers with £300,000 to spend could also snap up a luxury apartment in the Orion building in Birmingham city centre, or a two bedroom apartment in a stone-fronted period building in Clifton, one of the most desirable areas of Bristol. In London, the same figure could pay for a three bedroom terraced house in Canning Town, a three bedroom flat in Shepherds Bush, or a studio flat in the City within walking distance of Chancery Lane.



It costs more than a Rolls-Royce, and 15 times as much as the BMW 1 Series which seen in the space in the above picture.

Matthew Abernethy, associate director at Kay & Co, said: 'There are a number of properties in the area which range from £1 to £15 million and there are not enough parking spaces for all the residents.



'Parking in this part of prime central London is always scarce and the fact that people will pay more than the price of a small flat for the privilege of their own parking space is indicative of the desirability of having parking in Westminster.



'We anticipate that the space will attract interest from local residents eager to secure parking close by.'



Parking fines in Westminster range between £80 and £130 depending on the severity of the offence, and they are halved if paid in less than 14 days.



This means, on the basis of the £40 fine, it would take more than 20 years - 7,300 days - to rack up £300,000 in fines.



However, over the period of the 91 year lease, it works out at just £9.20 per day to park in the space.



In 2011 an underground parking space near Harrods was put on the market for £200,000.



It is not just London where the price of a parking space has gone through the roof.

