The great return to London's most refined postcodes

As prices fall, wealthy families are moving back into the city's best neighbourhoods.

- Anna White

Addresses do not get much more prestigious than Wilton Place in Belgravia. Residents over the years have included socialite and actor Lillie Langtry and Sir James MacDonnell, a military hero in the Battle of Waterloo. Plus, it's right by the Berkeley.

A grand five-storey terraced townhouse there with views over St Paul's Church Knightsbridge is languishing on the market. It was originally priced at £9 million but is now for sale for £6.5 million. It is one of many grandiose properties in central London's golden postcodes that have been reduced in price. Just off Kensington Palace Gardens is a five-bedroom apartment that has been gradually cut from £22 million to £14.95 million, a buying agent tells Homes & Property. While sales are traditionally driven by death, divorce and debt there is a new driver in central London - departure. Some sellers at this level are moving to another of their homes in a different global city due to the mounting tax burden and limited price growth. High-end landlords are leaving too, in face of growing regulation and vanishing profit margins. Of course, arguably, some of these prices were too high in the first place.

Although properties in these areas remain unimaginably expensive, slashed prices are tempting wealthy British families back into central London from the outer suburbs and the Home Counties, the reverse of the typical property rite of passage. A decade ago, if you sold up and moved out it was most likely a permanent switch to cash in and upsize. With values continually on the up, it meant getting priced out of the exclusive, family-orientated areas such as Notting Hill, Holland Park, South Kensington and Chelsea.