Head to the North of England for an affordable seaside home

If you want to live by the sea, the best advice seems to be to move north. A Halifax survey into the most affordable seaside towns in England and Wales found the lowest house price-to-incomes ratio exists north of the line between the Wash and the Severn estuary.

Whitehaven in Cumbria was deemed the most affordable seaside town, followed by Maryport, also in Cumbria, and Withernsea in East Yorkshire. In all three towns, the house price to average earnings ratio is below the national long-term historical average of four.

The least affordable seaside towns are in the South West, with Sandbanks in Dorset recording the highest house price to earnings ratio (21.7).

Despite rapid property price falls throughout the country since the summer of 2007, nearly nine-tenths of the seaside towns surveyed have average house prices 100 per cent higher than they were eight years ago. Overall, the average house price in all seaside towns has increased by 115 per cent since 2001. This is higher than the 96 per cent rise in house prices across England and Wales as a whole.