The survey reveals that 79% of SIPP property investors plan to put money into buy-to-let properties, while 32% of respondents said they are planning to use their SIPPs to invest in overseas property, with Spain the most popular target closely followed by France.


Irvine is no.1 hotspot.

Irvine in Strathclyde, Scotland, is the UKs top property hotspot, having experienced a 44% rise in prices over the past year, to £100,249 in Q2 2005, according to Halifaxs latest quarterly regional house price survey.

The top-5 towns recording the biggest price increases in the last 12 months is Irvine, followed by Port-Talbot (43%), Motherwell (41%), Glenrothes (39%) and Blackwood in Gwent (38%).

At a county level, County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland (31%) has seen the biggest price rises over the last year followed by Highlands in Scotland (27%) and Dumfries & Galloway in Scotland (22%).

The gap between residential property prices in London and the rest of the UK has fallen to its lowest level in over seven years. Average property prices in the capital now stand at 1.47 times the national average.