Location:

Located in the metropolitan county of Merseyside in North West England, the city is situated on the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. Liverpool’s position as a port city has led to a rapidly increasing population over the years, most recent figures showing 498,000 inhabitants in 2019 (NOMIS). It is the sixth largest city in the UK in terms of population (City Monitor), and competes with Manchester and Leeds for northern regional capital status.

 

Connectivity:

The M6 and M62 provide main routes both south and northbound from Liverpool. To the east of the city the M62 links the city with Manchester and Leeds. The A41 also provides a route to Chester and Wales. Liverpool Lime Street is the largest railway station in the city, with direct services to London, Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds amongst other cities. Locally, Merseyrail have two lines connecting 68 stations in and around the Liverpool area. There are 4 principal city centre underground stations, and lines serve as far as Chester on the Wirral Line and Southport on the Northern Line.

Liverpool John Lennon Airport is the major international gateway to the Liverpool City Region, lying approximately 7 miles to the south of the city and being easily accessible by public transport. There is an extensive dock network dating from the industrial revolution, and Liverpool Port is one of the largest and busiest in the UK, ideally located for transatlantic trade with berths spanning both sides of the River Mersey (Peel Ports Group).

 

Amenities:

Liverpool has a variety of amenities in the city centre and along the River Mersey, with vibrant districts such as the Baltic Triangle and Ropewalks. Liverpool One, a shopping, residential and leisure complex anchored by John Lewis, Debenhams and an Odeon cinema, has lifted Liverpool into the top five most popular retail destinations in the UK. The Royal Albert Dock also houses popular attractions such as the Merseyside Maritime Museum, the Beatles Story and the Tate Liverpool.

 

Going out:

The city has a famously lively nightlife with a wide range of bars, restaurants and music events. The Ropewalks district has undergone a major transformation over the past decade, and features a plethora of chain bars and restaurants as well as nightclubs. These include Be At One, Almost Famous, Brewdog, Baa Bar, Soho, Revolution, Volume Lounge Aura, Ink Bar, Pure, Modo, Heebie Jeebies, Loco Club, 54 Liverpool, Level, Fusion and The Camel Club. Popular streets for bar crawls include Seel Street and Parr Street. Hardman Street is a 10 minute walk away and offers the city’s best variety of traditional pubs. Dale Street, Cumberland Street and Eberle Street are the centre of Liverpool’s LGBT nightlife, also only a short walk away from the famous Cavern Club. There is a good range of chain bars and restaurants in this area too, including the Slug & Lettuce, Viva Brazil, Wetherspoon, Neighbourhood, The Restaurant Bar & Grill and The Alchemist.

  

Sport:

Liverpool and Everton are two of the world’s biggest football clubs, attracting fans from across the globe. Liverpool is also well-known for the Aintree Racecourse, home to the annually held Grand National, and England’s Golf Coast, with three Royal Links courses having hosted many Open Championships and Ryder Cups. The Echo Arena also holds large-scale sporting events, such as boxing and gymnastics.

  

Economy and employment:

Liverpool was ranked by Arcadis as the top fourth UK city for economic growth potential, key indicators being workforce and skills, infrastructure, business environment, place, city brand, and housing (RW Invest). A £150 million regeneration programme named ‘Project Jennifer’ has seen the radical redevelopment of Great Homer Street to create a new district centre, Liverpool’s largest Sainsbury’s, 80,000 sq ft of new shops, new indoor and outdoor market facilities, new homes, a transport interchange and improved links to Everton Park. The scheme has generated an estimated 1,000 jobs (Aspen Woolf). Furthermore, a £1.4bn plan to help Liverpool’s post- coronavirus economy has been set out, with the Mayor of Liverpool having submitted a report to the Prime Minister outlining aims including physical construction and skills training programmes which would reportedly create 25,600 jobs and more than 9,700 apprenticeships (Business Live).

 

Employment (NOMIS, Oct 2019-Sept 2020)

Liverpool

North West

Great Britain

69.1%

74.2%

75.7%

 

Earnings:

Latest gross average earnings (by place of residence) for Liverpool equate to £29,784 per year. This compares with £29,252 in the North West (-1.9%), and £30,613 across the rest of Great Britain (+2.8%).

 

Gross weekly pay (NOMIS, 2020)

Liverpool

North West

Great Britain

Earnings by place of residence

£574.90

£560.30

£587.10

Earnings by place of work

£591.80

£559.60

£586.70

 

Housing:

Average property prices in Liverpool have seen an impressive 26% increase between December 2015 and 2020, sitting above the growth seen over the same period across England as a whole (23%). However, a detached property in Liverpool in December 2020 was still on average c.24% cheaper when compared to the national average of £386,257.

 

UK House Price Index (LEEDS)

Date

Detached

Semi-detached

Terraced

Flat

All property types

% change all types

Dec 2010

£209,222

£131,719

£96,751

£94,700

£112,532

N/A

Dec 2015

£222,829

£140,029

£101,226

£95,762

£117,761

4.6%

Dec 2020

£293,092

£181,614

£129,183

£114,743

£148,324

26.0%



UK House Price Index (ENGLAND)

Date

All property types

% change

 

Dec-10

£173,417

N/A

 

Dec-15

£215,023

24.0%

 

Dec-20

£264,446

23.0%

 

 

Education:

Liverpool is home to a total of four universities: University of Liverpool; Liverpool John Moores University; Liverpool Hope University; and The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. Together, these higher education providers attracted a total of 60,520 undergraduates and postgraduates to the city during the 2019/20 academic year. The city also hosts Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, a postgraduate centre of excellence in its field, which was awarded higher education institution status in 2013 and Degree Awarding Powers in 2017. The institutuion had 420 postgraduate students in 2019/20

 

 


Full-time undergraduate students 2019/20 (HESA)

2016/17

2017/18

2018/19

2019/20

 

University of Liverpool

20,325

21,525

22,200

22,150

 

Liverpool John Moores University

17,240

17,685

17,670

18,605

 

Liverpool Hope University

3,810

3,775

3,735

3,815

 

The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts

745

795

810

865

 

Totals

42,120

43,780

44,415

45,435

 

% change on previous year

N/A

3.9%

1.5%

2.5%

 



Percentage international students (The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2021)

University of Liverpool

27.7%

 

Liverpool John Moores University

2.4%

 

Liverpool Hope University

1.4%

 

 

Where students live:

Most first year students opt to start in university owned or purpose built blocks, where they can make the most of meeting other new students and making groups of friends. The trend tends then to find groups of four to ten students grouping together for their second year and rent a shared house or HMO (house in multiple occupation) for their second year. This is more like living at home as houses can come with gardens, parking and are usually more spacious and less institutional than living in a hall. In their final year – when students really have to stop partying put their head down and work – many choose studio flats, smaller groupings or to go back into halls.

Postgraduates are more likely to have self-contained one bed flats and studios in the city and these could be rented in the private market or form part of the offering in some purpose built student blocks.

There are pros and cons of shared house living compared to halls of residence. Pretty much all students experience both during their three or four years at university.

 

Purpose-built student accommodation

The University of Liverpool, Liverpool John Moores University and Liverpool Hope University all guarantee university-owned student accommodation for first years. The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts neither own nor manage any of their own accommodation, instead recommending a select few schemes on their website all within close proximity to their campus. There is a generous offering of PBSA in Liverpool giving students options across the entire spectrum, from older stock student halls with shared flats to brand-new luxury blocks with large en-suite rooms. The majority of this new build student accommodation has been constructed between 2017-2020 in the city centre, largely located in the Knowledge Quarter, Georgian Quarter and Ropewalks district. In their Q4 2020 Residential Update, City Residential report the number of students living in purpose built units in the city centre core as 19,600, with 22,216 in the expanded city core. They also state that 1,388 new student units are due for delivery in 2021, with a further 1,007 in 2022.

 


Purpose built student accommodation supply

Current supply

10,068

 

Full time students

60,865

 

Under supply

50,797

 


Purpose-built student accommodation costs per week (The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2021)

Self-catered

Catered

 

University of Liverpool

£138 - £212

£212 - £213

 

Liverpool John Moores University

£85 - £166

N/A

 

Liverpool Hope University

£90 - £125

N/A

 

Private accommodation

£83 - £395

N/A

 

Shared house and flat market:

The majority of students choosing to live in house or flat shares are drawn to the Wavertree area of the city, centred around the ever-popular Smithdown Road. This area comprises Victorian terraces offering house shares for multiple students, with some having been transformed into separate self-contained one, two and three bed student flats, as well as studios for solo occupation. The most popular streets include: Borrowdale Road, Kenmare Road, Claremont Road, Avondale Road, Brookdale Road, Langdale Road and Ferndale Road. Universities can be reached by either bus or train from this area, alternatively the University of Liverpool is only a 20 minute walk away. Kensington is also emerging as an increasingly popular area for student house shares. City Residential report the number of students living in non-purpose built units (i.e. privately let shared houses or flats) in the city centre core as 3,792 and 4,599 in the expanded city core.

 

University of Liverpool:

The University of Liverpool is one of the founding members of the Russell Group. The new Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) has most recently categorised the university as silver and it currently places 29th in the Times Good University Guide 2021. The university has already made significant investments in its campus and facilities, with £600m spent on its city centre campus to make improvements and room for more undergraduates, and a £1 billion 15 year masterplan under consultation which will include a £23 million building for the School of Architecture and £42 million of development for electrical engineering and electronics facilities amongst other significant additions. £250 million has also been spent on the university’s student accommodation. More than 2,000 study bedrooms were added on campus in two years, and if applicants make Liverpool their first choice they are guaranteed a room.

 

Liverpool John Moores University:

LJMU is the second largest university in Liverpool with over 24,000 students enrolled. The £100m development that will see all students taught in the city centre is due for completion in 2021 after experiencing some delays. Copperas Hill, which includes a Student Life Building, sports building and a further phase still to be commenced, is located near Lime Street Station and is a joint venture with the University of Liverpool. LJMU is best known for its World of Work (WoW) programme, which improves undergraduates’ employability and encourages development of transferable skills through both paid and voluntary work experiences. Furthermore, The Times Good University Guide 2021 reported that almost three quarters of graduates left with a first or a 2:1 last year. The university was award silver in the new Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) and places 78th in The Times Good University Guide 2021.

 

Liverpool Hope University

This is the only one of Liverpool’s university’s to have a gold rating in the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF). In 2018 the university purchased several buildings adjoining the original campus which enabled the addition of an arts centre or ‘Creative Campus’, which included a food court, further study space, library facilities, two theatres, a recording studio and dance studios. The Times Good University Guide 2021 ranked it 60th overall, down from last year and largely attributable to a fall in student satisfaction. The university has a Service and Leadership Award, which students are encouraged to partake in by volunteering locally or internationally as part of Global Hope, the university’s Christian-orientated charity working in Romania, Kenya, and India

 

 

The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts

LIPA, co-founded by Sir Paul McCartney, opened in 1996 and was the first purpose built art school outside London. They are a specialist school offering numerous undergraduate degrees, masters’ degrees and foundation certificate courses. Each academic year sees two seasons of public performances, with a view to upholding the institute’s principal focus of ‘sustained work for people who want to survive in the world of arts and entertainment’. LIPA ranked 74th out of 154 in the National Student Survey 2020, with an impressive overall score of 82.87%.