A street in east London has more estate agents in it than anywhere else in the country, it has been claimed.

It is named as Hoe Street, Walthamstow, which has 75 retail outlets, of which 24 are used as estate agents’ offices.

It comes ahead of Church Street, Barnes, south-west London (32 shops, including 11 estate agencies) and High Street, Dorking, Surrey, with 13 estate agencies among a total of 42 shops.

In fourth place is Ashley Road, Hale, near Manchester (ten estate agency branches out of 40 retail outlets), and in fifth place is Balham Hill, London, with 16 agents out of 80 retail outlets.

The research, however, may not be particularly scientific.

Online agent Russell Quirk, who commissioned it, told Eye: “The results were garnered through word of mouth and Google searches, and then comparisons with other high streets in London and the UK.”

Quirk’s press release, headed: “Britain’s most estate agent-infested high street revealed” was widely used along with his comments: “We often hear that estate agents are taking over our high streets, and our research has found that not only is it true, but it’s true to an alarming extent.

“Vendors need to take a stand, save money and sell their property online to preserve their high street for the years to come.

“A vast proportion of the fees that vendors hand over to estate agents funds expensive high street locations, plush furnishings, Mini Coopers and so on.”

Well, we know that Quirk – like so many other online agents – is a man on a mission and cannot resist creating opportunities to promote his cause while taking a pop at his high street peers. Surely somebody must have told him that any number of national journalists can safely be entrusted to put the boot into agents, but it does of course get him newspaper headlines.

Indeed, echoing the one in the press release, the Huffington Post’s headline was: “Most estate-agent infested UK High Street.”

It went on quote Walthamstow MP, the equally tireless Stella Creasy who is also Labour shadow business minister, who took the opportunity to jump aboard a number of band-wagons.

She told the paper: “The proliferation of estate agents in Walthamstow comes at the same time there is evidence of sharp practices like double charging for fees which is unfair to both buyers and sellers of properties. Contracts like this are pushing prices up and people out of our area, as well as creating unmanageable levels of debt in our community.

“Yet frighteningly for those of us living in the eye of the Help to Buy property storm, the Government has delegated the oversight of all 500,000 agents in this country to Powys County Council, showing how out of touch they are with the problems in this industry.

“Walthamstow’s main street crammed with agents is a long way from the gaze of rural Wales!

“That’s why we’re campaigning to end double charging and to hold agents to account for the impact of their policies on our community. I hope the Coalition starts to finally listen before home ownership becomes too distant a dream for many more here in London E17.”

Did she really say 500,000 estate agents? Why, even the Office for National Statistics put the headcount at only 241,000 and even that turned out on investigation to be statistically unsound as its “real estate activities” included builders, commercial agents and plenty of others.

Anyway, we would love to hear from any agents in Hoe Street, Walthamstow, who include the likes of Winkworth, Kings Group, Douglas Allen, haart and Ludlowthompson, plus a number of small independents.

Are you all doing a lot of business on Hoe Street, and where do you go for lunch?