Are wealthy buyers stoking St Andrews’ housing crisis?

A quiet Fife seaside town with a famous golf course and one of the UK’s top universities is grappling with a housing crisis that local people say is being fuelled in part by wealthy buyers from outside Scotland.

New data shows that nearly one in five properties in St Andrews were registered to an address outside of Scotland when purchased, including 164 buyers from the United States alone. The figures have sharpened a long-running debate about how the town can continue to function for the people who live there all year round.

The last census put the population of St Andrews at just over 16,000. But on its busiest days, walking through the town can feel more like navigating the centre of a busy European city. For locals, the economic benefits of the town’s appeal to visitors are clear, but the knock-on effect for house and rental prices is taking its toll.

A town stretched by its own success

St Andrews has a great deal going for it. It is home to a world-class university, the home of golf, and a pretty coastal setting that attracts tourists, students, and retirees in large numbers. That appeal is exactly what is driving the pressure on housing.

Fife Council has said finding reasonably priced housing in St Andrews is a major challenge, and has introduced measures such as quotas of affordable housing in new developments to try to help. The town’s university has capped its student numbers at around 10,000 for nearly a decade because of the pressure on housing and other local amenities.

The problem is not simply a matter of student demand. Local estate agents have reported a steady trade in wealthy parents buying local homes for their children to live in during their time at university, as well as people attracted to the town by its golf courses. The pattern is one in which people with significant amounts of money are competing for a limited supply of property in a very desirable location.

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What the numbers show

Data from property firm Rightmove shows that average advertised rents in St Andrews over the last year have been £1,702 per month, compared with the Scottish average of £1,245 per month. The gap is substantial and shapes the experience of people trying to find somewhere to live.

Data from property firm Rettie shows that the average sale price for houses in St Andrews over the last 12 months was £482,879, more than twice the Scottish average, and up from £312,464 a decade ago. Dr John Boyle, the firm’s director of research and strategy, described the town as a hot market in a Scottish context.

He said that when tourists come to St Andrews they sometimes think it might not be a bad place to retire to, which adds to the downsizer demand in the community. He said the town benefits from the university setting, so there are both a lot of students and a lot of staff, and that it is very sought after by a whole range of different buyers, including those with significant amounts of money to spend.

Figures released to BBC Scotland from Registers of Scotland show that in the KY16 8 and KY16 9 postcodes in St Andrews, 5,494 of the titles in the land register were lodged with people or firms based in Scotland at the time of purchase, 81 per cent of the total. A further 845, 12 per cent, were registered to addresses in the rest of the UK, and 444, 7 per cent, were outside the UK.

The overseas registrations went to a total of 51 different countries or crown dependences, including Russia and the Cayman Islands. A total of 164 St Andrews titles went to a United States address, 37 per cent of all overseas registrations, followed by Switzerland with 30, and Hong Kong with 28. Registers of Scotland data shows St Andrews is ranked fourth out of the top ten postcode sectors in Scotland with the most overseas buyers.

The view from the ground

Francesca Bisi, a fourth-year PhD student in the School of Art History at the University of St Andrews, knows the pressures from the inside. She is commuting to her studies from a nearby village after being unable to get affordable accommodation in the town. She said it has been really stressful to try to navigate the housing market, and that even in her fourth year it is still causing a huge challenge.

She said it distracts from her work and her studies and really takes a huge toll on her mental health. She added that any savings she has been able to put aside always end up being drained in whatever down payment is required, because in this market you cannot really be picky and you just feel lucky that you found any place at all.

Amy Elvins, of the St Andrews University Students’ Association, said the high rents have ultimately meant that all power lies with landlords, which means students are potentially having to work full time. She said it has created a market in which the understanding is that all houses in town will be filled, so it does not really matter what standard they are or what price they are at. She said members of the community are also being priced out, and what is ultimately needed is more affordable rentable housing.

Ben Stuart, director of residential and business services at the University of St Andrews, highlighted the university’s annual £480m contribution to Scotland’s economy and its support for 9,000 jobs in the Fife and Tayside area. He said St Andrews obviously borders the ocean and green belts, so there is not a lot of space left to provide that type of housing.

He said all entities have to get together and understand how they can relieve the pressures, and that students are often unfairly blamed for the housing situation when evidence shows it is a much more complex picture. He added that quite often those with the deepest pockets are simply outbidding locals by a substantial margin, and that often those with the deepest pockets are from overseas.

Debbie MacCallum, a local entrepreneur and chairwoman of St Andrews Business Improvement District, said the town’s international profile supports thousands of jobs and is hugely valuable to local businesses and the wider economy. She said a globally recognised town also has to work for the people who live there all year round, and that St Andrews is, first and foremost, a community.

The road ahead

The big looming change in the local housing market is new developments on the town’s outskirts that will deliver more than 1,000 new homes. This will increase the overall supply, but John Mills, head of housing for Fife Council, pointed out that 30 per cent of the homes on these sites would be affordable housing.

He said finding affordable housing in St Andrews is a major challenge and there is no single solution, which is why the council is taking a range of steps to help improve housing options for local people. He pointed to policies such as control areas for the number of short-term lets and an ongoing review of how key workers are allocated council housing.

Why it matters

St Andrews is a small town with a global reputation, and the tension in its housing market is a concentrated version of a problem that appears in other popular UK locations. The question is how to preserve the town’s character and economy without pricing out the people who keep it running: students, staff, key workers, and ordinary residents.

The overseas buyer figures give the debate a sharper edge, because they point to demand that is not just national but international. That does not make every overseas buyer a problem, but it does suggest that local housing strategy cannot look only at domestic patterns if it wants to be effective.

What happens next

The new developments on the outskirts will be one test of whether more supply can ease the pressure, particularly with the 30 per cent affordable housing element. The council’s review of short-term lets and key worker allocations will matter too. For now, people in St Andrews are still making the case that the town needs to work for its permanent residents as much as for its visitors, its golfers, and its students.