Overseas families and groups staying for the London 2012 Olympic Games are more prone to renting a house for accommodation according London Property Rental 2012.

London Property Rental 2012, whose experience has found significant regional differences in how nations are choosing to find their ideal findings, are backed by an April 2011 report from Visit Britain* that investigated accommodation choices made by inbound visitors to the UK.

According to Carol Fox, owner at London Property Rental, "A large proportion of enquiries for our luxury Olympic 2012 lets have came from the US or France and Benelux regions, so we decided to follow this up to see if there are regional differences in what type of accommodation for London 2012 visitors are most interested in booking. What we found appears to show a general trend for the French and Spanish to travel in large family groups and value the opportunity of cooking their own meals whilst sharing the communal benefits of renting comfortable homes for the games.

Visitors from the United States are used to booking luxury homes for rent by owners, and enjoy the flexibility of self-catering and eating out combined with the extra facilities offered by letting a house for the London Olympics including, satellite TV, fast broadband, garden and free parking . Whereas German and Dutch visitors seem to be more interested in finding functional accommodation such as that offered by hostels, B&B’s or camping."

London Property Rental 2012's experience is reflected in findings from Visit Britain that investigated accommodation choices made by inbound visitors to the UK. The report aggregated and analyzed data from 2001 onwards to get a robust view of accommodation data on a market by market level. Amongst the findings are that ‘visitors from the Netherlands have a much higher propensity to be found camping or in mobile homes (5 per cent)’ and ‘Recent years have seen Glamping – a sort of luxury camping is particularly popular with the Dutch’. 

Oxford Economics estimates in an independent report that around 450,000 visitors will stay in London during the 2012 Olympics. ‘Next year’s games will see the highest concentration of global visitors that London has ever experienced. We are finding many visitors are choosing to escape the congestion and hotel room price hikes of up to 50 per cent by opting for the convenience and cost efficiency of a ‘home from home’ over a hotel room for London 2012’ say Fox.