Beaconsfield is the most expensive market town in England.

The average house price of £958,909 is 160 per cent or £589,808 above the county average. According to this week’s report from Lloyds Bank, no other market town in the country commands a higher premium.

Second place in the premium stakes goes to the horse racing market town of Wetherby but at just 100 per cent above the average in West Yorkshire, Wetherby is several furlongs behind the front runner from Buckinghamshire.

The results for second place change when the findings are judged on the price paid by homebuyers rather than the size of premium.

Played by these rules it’s Henley with an average price of £758,000 which is second only to Beaconsfield in the table.

House prices in market towns across England have risen at a hair-raising £546 a month since 2006.

Values have shot up by 31 per cent in the past ten years to an overall average of £273,757 – 7.8 times the average gross earnings for full time workers.

The average mark-up to live in a market town is £34,000. One in five commands a premium of at least £100,000.

With the typical cost of a house in Beaconsfield now nudging £1m, the town has become a fixture at the top of league tables.

Only last month Beaconsfield High School was placed first in a Lloyds Bank survey examining the correlation between the 30 top performing secondary state schools in the country and house prices in the local post code areas.

The only time the town fails to be a jewel in the crown is when analysts add the cost of a season ticket to local house prices to work out how much commuters stand to gain by living outside the capital instead of in Zones 1 and 2.

In surveys of that kind, the sums work in reverse for Buckinghamshire’s most sought-after area – the average house price in Beaconsfield is higher than the average for Central London.

Lloyds Bank mortgages director Any Mason says the attraction of market towns is due to quality of life associated with country living – “idyllic surroundings, history and wonderful homes without compromising on many other important amenities.”