Kinleigh, Folkard and Hayward is increasing its presence in West Hampstead, north west London, where it is doubling the size of its existing high street office on West End Lane.

KFH is taking over the old Black Katz office next door with a view to accommodating more staff as it looks to increase market share in the local area.

Robert McLaughlin, KFH sales director for north, north west and west London, told EYE: “We are expanding our West Hampstead sales and lettings branch in response to the strong local property market.

“This expansion strengthens our presence in north west London and the team is well supported by our existing network, including our Queen’s Park branch which opened in July last year. We believe our increased presence will be significantly beneficial to our customers and clients in the area.”

The KFH branch, which is located in a prime location, across the road from several other estate agents, including Paramount and Hamptons, featured in the news earlier this year when estate agents were filmed allegedly inhaling drugs from balloons at an after-hours party in the office.

The incident was exposed by the Mail Online after a passer-by filmed and uploaded a 15-second clip of the incident onto TikTok.

Workers at the branch had earlier participated in an online awards event during the afternoon and instead of going home at the close of business some then stayed on in the office to party.

In the film a female agent can be seen apparently inhaling from a yellow balloon while a male colleague holds a white balloon to his mouth. Hippy crack, or nitrous oxide, is illegal for recreational.

A spokesman for KFH said in February that they had launched an investigation into what took place inside the offices after they were closed to members of the public.

A statement from the agency stated at the time: “On Friday 11 February we closed our offices at 4pm and hosted our annual awards virtually.

“We are aware of the video circulating on social media and are in the process of investigating why several members of staff remained in one of our offices into the evening.

Due to the investigation being ongoing, the company was not prepared to comment further.