Top of the table: the World Athletics Championships 2017 are underway in east London, but home owners in the Olympic boroughs have already won gold

As all eyes hit east London this week for the World Athletics Championships, the Olympic legacy on the area’s house prices since 2012 — a result of improved transport links and investment — is once again in the spotlight.

Homes in the 14 areas surrounding the Olympic Park have gone up in price by an average of 64 per cent in the five years since 2012. In cash terms, the average monthly increase was £4,279 – equivalent to the monthly take home pay of someone earning £75,000 a year.

This is a third higher than the London-wide price rise (38 per cent) and two thirds higher than the average price rise across England and Wales, according to the research from Halifax.

Walthamstow, E17, where first-time buyers and second steppers have been snapping up the area’s Victorian Warner flats in droves, saw the fastest five-year growth of all the areas, with prices doubling from £238,000 to £479,000.

House prices have also surged in formerly unfavoured Zone 3 spots as a result of Olympic investment. Leyton, E10, has seen a 93 per cent price rise in the five years since the Games; prices in Forest Gate have risen by 81 per cent; and Manor Park and Plaistow have both seen 73 per cent price growth.

MAJOR REGENERATION

The report attributed the price boost to the massive investment in east London that accompanied the Olympics in the run up to the event, and that has continued since it ended.

“Hosting the 2012 Games welcomed major regeneration to boost areas close to the Olympic Park in East London,” said Martin Ellis, housing economist at Halifax.

“Large-scale infrastructure investment in the existing Tube networks, an international rail station and now Crossrail have not only created jobs in the area, but improved options for people to move around the capital.”

With no Tube stations, the London Overground east London extension, which opened in 2011 and linked Dalston Junction with Tube services at Highbury & Islington, has been a major draw for buyers in hipster Hackney.

Four areas in the borough have had price rises of more than £200,000 since 2012: Homerton (£233,000); Clapton (£231,000); Shoreditch (£230,000); and Dalston (£207,000).

THE EARLY BIRD CATCHES THE PRICE GROWTH

All 14 Olympic areas have recorded price growth of over £125,000 in the past five years, but investment in property in the area began as soon as London was awarded the Games in 2005.

East London property prices have risen 128 per cent in the 12 years since July 2005, while prices in Greater London have gone up by 106 per cent. Prices in England and Wales have risen 51 per cent over the same period.