Rising house prices in London will lead to a flight of current home owners and expats looking elsewhere in 2017, a house finding service has claimed.

Stacks Property Search says it is the home counties where activity will prosper.

Sally Fraser, of Stacks Property Search said the generation of London leavers who have been procrastinating, watching their properties grow in value and being too nervous to leave the capital, will finally make the move next year.

She said: “Now the London market has plateaued, and the country is priced well relative to London values, Londoners will up-sticks and move to pursue good schools and a healthier lifestyle.”

While some analysts think the low post-Brexit vote pound and Trump presidency will lead buyers to London, Stacks claims otherwise, saying the price may now deter foreign buyers.

Her colleague Bill Spreckley said: “Expats whose first purchase on their return to the UK would traditionally be a London home will bypass the capital and go straight to the home counties or beyond.

“The costs of buying and selling are now too onerous to make an ‘interim’ purchase viable.”

Stacks is also predicting price increases in the rental market, particularly in student towns, and the end of the “the stand-off in the £2m+ price bracket” as vendors realise that if they don’t reduce the price, they won’t achieve a sale.