Islington residents renting out homes for �2k a week for Royal Wedding

People with homes in Islington, Highbury and Archway are hoping to profit from the hordes of tourists expected to descend on London around the time of the wedding on April 29.

Dozens of houses and flats have been advertised as the perfect base from which to soak up the celebratory atmosphere of the four-day weekend on classified and property websites such as Gumtree and Airbnb.

Aslak Hellesoy, a software developer with a two-bedroom flat in Canonbury, is hoping to rake it in to the tune of �340 a night – more than the cost of a double room at the Ritz.

He said: “I’m certainly bumping up the price. I expect a lot of tourists will be coming to London because of the wedding and I plan to get out of town because it doesn’t interest me.”

A four-bedroom house in Highbury is another of the properties on offer, for a cool �2,000 for the week. The Gumtree advert describes it as the “perfect base for a family or large group intending to visit London during the week of the Royal Wedding”.

A “Beautiful flat to rent for the Royal Wedding week” with one bedroom is available in Islington for �1,500, while one room in a shared four-bedroom house in Archway is going for �450 – a rate that could get you a month in a similar room at another time.

On Airbnb, a two bedroom house in Essex Road, Islington, is advertised with a fee of �285 a night.

Stephen Rapoport, founder of the website Crashpad, said: “For the royal wedding, we’re seeing people increase their prices by about 106 per cent.”

The property website FindaProperty said there was a three-fold increase in hotel bookings in London for late April within days of the Royal Wedding announcement – a level of demand that suggests those hoping to make some easy money could be successful.

FindaProperty has also conducted a survey that it claims revealed one in four London homeowners are considering renting out part or all of their property at the time of the wedding.