More than 138,000 residential and commercial properties in England and Wales are owned by offshore companies, with holdings in London valued at a combined £55bn.
The findings come as the government begins a crackdown to dismantle the secrecy that surrounds offshore property ownership, which it said had been used by “corrupt elites laundering money through UK property”.
The Land Registry lists about 94,000 property titles as owned by offshore companies, but many titles include multiple properties on a single plot. By counting all of the properties owned, researchers from the Wealth Chain Project have found an additional 44,000.
