“BOY BANDS have got a lot to answer for,” says Matt Steggles, senior marketing consultant at Douglas Allen estate agents in Walthamstow. “People think of Walthamstow and they think of silly hats and baggy trousers, but then they come here and they’re very pleasantly surprised, not least by the fact that they can pick up a three-bedroom house for £300,000.”

It’s fair to say that Walthamstow has had something of an image problem. Mention the place to most nonresidents and they think of the dog track, where a young David Beckham topped up his then meagre earnings by collecting glasses, and East 17, the Nineties boy band who not only named themselves after the area’s postcode but called their first album Walthamstow in case anyone had missed the point. But things have been changing in this corner of northeast London for some time.

An influx of young professionals priced out of the market elsewhere in London has been quietly colonising the area since the end of the 1990s, attracted by affordable prices and exceptional transport links: Liverpool Street is 15 minutes by rail, Oxford Circus half an hour by Tube. Proximity to the 2012 Olympics site is now an added boost. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors says of the Games that, “in relation to property investment and development, it will transform East London”.

The hub of the area is the high street, a pedestrianised artery that’s home to the longest street market in Europe. Dating from the 19th century, the market has around 350 stalls selling high-quality fresh fruit and veg for next to nothing — spend more than a fiver and you may have difficulty carrying it all home — along with discount clothes, household goods, toys and CDs. The town square and gardens at one end of the market have undergone major refurbish-ment, as has the previously grim bus station.

Signs of gentrification are still rare; there are few of the trendy bars and restaurants that have sprung up in neighbouring Hackney over the last decade, and Walthamstow is a long way from gaining a reputation as cool or arty, unlike Hoxton or Bow. Jacky Cooper runs Manze’s Pie and Mash Shop on the high street, with its stunning tiled and mirrored interior, which has been in her family since 1927. “We’re seeing the clientele very slowly starting to change,” she says.

“The first signs are there,” says Matt Steggles. “A couple of smart bars and nice restaurants are springing up, but it’s still very embryonic. I think in a couple of years you will really notice the difference. What you are already seeing is a much higher personal investment in the area, with people spending a lot of money on interiors because they intend to stay here. Where Walthamstow has historically been a place of transition, there’s a growing sense of loyalty and a lot of civic pride.”

This spirit can be seen in the Che T-shirts emblazoned with the legend “Viva Walthamstow”, on sale in the Walthamstow village conservation area, very active community groups, and a fierce campaign to refurbish and reopen the derelict Grade II listed EMD cinema, home to the UK’s only surviving cinema organ.

Walk out of Walthamstow Central station on to Hoe Street, which adjoins the eastern end of the market, and on first impression it feels as though you have stepped into some parallel universe where there’s nothing but estate agents. One of the few premises that isn’t one (or a firm of conveyancing solicitors) is the Diana Café, which on Saturdays appears to be full of young couples studying handfuls of property details.

“I’d say around 70 per cent of our clients are first-time buyers,” says Neil Ewen, of Central Estate Agents. “They’re renting in Islington or Crouch End or Muswell Hill, but there’s no way they can afford to buy there. The remainder are people who already own a place somewhere else in North or East London, are maybe starting a family or thinking of having a second child, and they’re selling their two-bedroom flat to buy a three-bedroom house for the same money. I think people are surprised when they come here — they have a fixed image of what it’s like, but they find it’s a nice, green area, and the market gives it a lot of hustle and bustle. The Olympics has given people even more confidence in the area as an investment.”

Not everyone is pleased with the changes. On-line bulletin boards reveal fears of a loss of local identity, and the huge “arcade” development site near the market is controversial and still standing empty after the council and the developers parted company. And, when the market stalls have packed up, the high street can feel bleak, with long stretches of shuttered pound shops, amusement arcades and fast-food emporia.

“The area is changing very fast,” says one local resident, Simon Wright, a former Waltham Forest councillor who is still actively involved in regeneration issues. “What we haven’t yet seen fully worked out is how the spending power of young people who are moving here benefits the area. Often they’ll sleep here and have their home life here, but when it comes to shopping and socialising they still tend to go elsewhere. We need those shops and bars so that everyone in the area can fully benefit.”

GOING UP OR DOWN? Up SCORE: 3/5

Fact file

• 225,000 people live in the London Borough of Waltham Forest; owner occupation is just over 55 per cent.

• The average price of two-bed flats locally has risen by 25 per cent in four years; they now cost from £180,000.

• The closest 2012 Olympic site will be three miles from Walthamstow High Street.

• It will remain as a public tennis and hockey centre after the Games.

• The trend in Barcelona, Athens and Sydney has been for prices in nearby areas to rise by an average of 66 per cent in the five years leading up to the Games.

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