Plockton has been held up as an example of what happens to a Highland village when too many of its houses end up in the hands of those only wanting them for holiday homes.
MSP Kate Forbes used the picturesque village – made famous by 1990s’ television series Hamish Macbeth – as an example when welcoming new figures that show the number of second homes in Scotland have reduced over the past six years, which industry experts have partly attributed to taxation.
Scottish Government figures show that the number of second homes in Scotland stood at 40,599 in 2012, but in September 2018 (the latest available figures) it had drastically reduced to 24,907. Over the same period second homes in the Highlands dropped from 4,520 to 3,891.