More than 138,000 residential and commercial properties in England and Wales are owned by offshore companies, with holdings in London worth a combined £55bn, according to a research.
The findings come as the government begins a crackdown to dismantle the secrecy that surrounds offshore property ownership, which it says has been used by “corrupt elites laundering money through UK property”. The land registry lists about 94,000 property titles as owned by offshore companies. By counting all of the properties owned, researchers have found an additional 44,000.
The research was conducted by the Wealth Chain Project, which works to highlight the impact that property investment via offshore tax havens has on socio-economic inequality.
