Andy Leek, 38, whose Notes to Strangers works are pasted onto walls and junction boxes across more than 20 British and European cities, has moved to Buenos Aires where the rents are several times cheaper and he travels back to the UK roughly every two months for work. The flight costs less than a monthly train season ticket between Bristol and London.

His move comes as the average UK private rent increased by a record 9.2% in the last year (11.2% in London), according to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics.

“I have so much love for London but I am so angry with it,” said Leek.

“I think a lot of people feel that way. The more the housing crisis completely hamstrings us, the more people are going to live in Glasgow, Manchester or far-flung corners of the world.”

In recent years, the soaring cost of renting has driven more and more people out of the capital. New analysis by Hamptons shows that in the first three months of 2024, 36% of London renters who decided to move house left the capital, up from 27% in 2012. The number quitting the city in the last year dropped slightly towards pre-pandemic levels.

“This is an impossible situation when groceries double in price,” Leek told The Guardian. “How are you meant to live? It’s a heightened version [of what is happening in the UK]. I went shopping with the lead singer and she was doing the maths [on the prices] in her head. You walk around the supermarket and you feel pain.”

Since moving to Argentina Leek has paid as little as £400 a month rent for an apartment and flown back to London four times saying: “It works out far cheaper than staying in London, dealing with the hassle and not getting by.”

His relocation 7,000 miles away is far more extreme than most people who are deciding to leave Britain’s most expensive rent hotspots in London. Private renters leaving the capital are now most likely to move to Epping in Essex, Broxbourne in Hertfordshire and Tonbridge and Malling in Kent, according to Hamptons’ research among its wider network of Countryside agencies. Other popular destinations for ex-London renters are Watford, Luton and Slough.