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In the 1930s, the makers of Monopoly placed 22 iconic London streets on their game board for wannabe property tycoons. Eighty years on, however, the price you’d pay in Monopoly money to own a slice of the capital hardly reflects the twenty-first-century reality.
Giving the game a 2017 reality check, London Fox Lettings has used data from Zoopla and the Government’s London Rents Map to show what you’d be paying IRL to rent and own property on the classic game’s streets. To give things an added flavour of authenticity they’ve even replaced the £200 you get for passing 'go', with the £27,531 average London salary, which, as we all depressingly know, is growing at a snail’s pace compared to rapidly rising house prices.
Brown-banded Old Kent Road and Whitechapel Road, remain the cheapest on the board, but you can expect to pay a hell of a lot more than £60 for a place to call your own there. In 2017, renters will pay an average of £350 per week for a property on Old Kent Road and £350 per week in Whitechapel. Meanwhile, those wanting to step on the property ladder are faced with an average house price of £741,892 on Old Kent Road and £608,970 in Whitechapel.
In fact, you’ll be forking out over £1million on average to buy a house in 17 of the board’s 26 locations. Even streets in the lesser light blue, pink and orange bands, including Euston Road, Northumberland Avenue, Marlborough Street and Bow Street, require the average house buyer to be a millionaire. Mayfair, as ever, remains the most expensive board location, but with an average house price of £2,546,363 or £650 p/w to rent.
The modernised board even includes the average weekly electricity and water expenditure and income tax. But what would a 2017-style ‘Chance Card’ look like? ‘Tinder date doesn’t work out, get an Uber back home lose £40’. Hmm, doesn't quite have the same ring to it.
Have you heard that the crying emoji, a flip-flop and a hashtag could be the new Monopoly tokens?