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French Property Prices

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Information about the French real estate market:  Such as apartment and house prices and rents, the number and value of sales, mortgages, household mortgage debt, housing affordability, housebuilding, and more.

It also includes information about the country’s environment: such as population, number of households, income per household, interest rate, inflation, and the value of other investments (stocks, bonds, gold).

Including some parallels with other countries: Mostly with the US, UK, and Germany,

The information is presented in the long term and compared to long-term trends.

  1. Updates on the French real estate market for 2025.
  2. Permanent English documentation about house prices and the housing market in France.
  3. Permanent French documentation about house prices, rents, and the French housing market.

 

1. Updates on the French real estate market for 2025.

The permanent papers mentioned in 2. and 3. below should be updated once a month or every three months.

1.1. Charts in English that show the French house market and its neighborhood since 1800

Long-term changes in the prices, values, and numbers of homes sold in France since the 1800s. Also shown are rents, inflation, household income, interest rates, mortgage credit, household mortgage debt, housing affordability, housebuilding, household numbers, and stock prices. Chart 5 shows how home prices, rents, and mortgage debt have changed over time in France, the US, the UK, Germany, Spain, and the Netherlands.

1.2. The National Institute of Statistics in France puts out price and rent statistics for homes.

Prices

Notaires-Insee lists of French home price indices

– Property already there: The Notaires-INSEE apartment and house price index has all the past data from 1992 to the present day. It includes individual indices for Paris, Lyon, Marseille, and their surrounding regions and cities, as well as ABC zones. Methodology: short version in English; full version in French.

– New property, old property, and new property.

Rents: the French statistical office publishes main home rent indices. These indices track rents that tenants actually pay, excluding expenses, and support the rent component of the consumer price index. They are not the same as the reference rent index, which is used to set leases; see exhibit 1 of this report for a comparison of the different ways that rents can go up.

You can also get information about rent amounts seen around rent observatories and advertising all over France.

1.3. The sales of apartments and houses that are already there in France

Find out about the past patterns of flat and house sales in France. This information gives a detailed look at the number of sales of existing homes from 1967 to 2024, giving a moving 12-month estimate for the whole country.

There is a thorough explanation (in French) of the methods for anyone who wants to know more about how the data was collected and analyzed.

1.4. The sale of homes Transactions that are subject to regular tax by the department

You can look at sales of property in France that are subject to normal transaction tax from 2004 to 2024. This set of info has:

As long as the regular transaction tax rate is used, this tax applies to all assets, whether they are homes or businesses.

Visualization: Interactive maps and charts let you look at data from a specific department.

Annual Estimates: Gives an estimate for France as a whole and for each area that is updated every 12 months.

Along with the data is a lengthy (in French) explanation of the approach that makes sure you fully understand how things work.

1.5. Base of the Property Transaction Tax by Department

It is now easier to understand France’s property transaction tax base because full, up-to-date statistics from 2000 to 2024 is now available. All of France’s departments and areas can use this information to learn more about property sales, tax rates, and trends.

Some important things about this site are:

The information covers all of France, from big cities like Île-de-France (Paris and the departments that surround it) to rural places like Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Bretagne, and Occitanie. There are notes about changes to tax collection codes, like how Corsica has had a united 2A code since July 2019 and how Alsace will be part of the 68 code starting in January 2021.

For more information, look at the interactive maps or the list of charts that are unique to each area.

1.6. More Property Statistics for France

The Cerema agency uses DV3F data from the Tax Department to give a lot of past information about the home markets in France since 2010. There are downloaded files, charts, and maps that give you a lot of information about different aspects of real estate.

 

Some other important tools are:

The Quarterly Housing and Construction Bulletin is a group of more than 100 quarterly series that have been published since 1980.

There are detailed data on the number and prices of new homes offered by developers, as well as studies that look at trends in property development.

Data on land and housing:

Economic Reports Every Month: These are reports from the National Institute of Statistics and the Bank of France. They include new information on the economy of building and the trends in small construction companies.

Sources of Housing Data: There is a hand-picked list of 79 data sources about housing, and Etalab has more than 100 sources on housing and cities.

 

2. Long-term English materials on the prices and market for French homes

Long-term English materials on the prices and market for French homes from 1800 to 2020, to back up and update the charts and papers above and below: There are many things that affect housing, such as the number and total value of sales, interest rates, the length of mortgages, family income and mortgage debt, investments in stocks, bonds, and gold, the population, the number of households, and the building cost index. These shows have some episodes about France, the US, and the UK.

Prices of homes in Paris since 1200. This information, including secular series, is talked about in the study “Comparing Four Secular Home Price Indices.”

“Capital in the Twenty-First Century” by T. Piketty: How UK and French Capital Contributes to the Drop in National Income.” If you update numbers 6.1. and 6.8 from T. Piketty’s “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” without changing how they were calculated, they show the opposite: in the UK and France, the share of capital in national income has been going down lately.

“Home Prices in France Over Time,” a talk given in June 2012.

“Home Prices in France: Past and Future – on One Page,” October 2010, English description of what’s in 4.

“A Look at Four Nonreligious Home Price Indices,” June 2008. Four long-term house price indices from France, the Netherlands, Norway, and the US are compared. One of them is from the 1300s for Paris. You should be careful when looking at their long-term trend.

“Prospects for Long-Term Investment in Gold, Bonds, Stocks, and Housing in France from 1800 to 2005—with Some Lessons for the US and UK,” January 2007. The prices of assets have changed over the last two hundred years. Long-term home prices in Britain and France are shown in Exhibit 1. Exhibit 2 shows the return, fluctuation, and diversification power of assets made across the French-American line over the past two hundred years.

“Home Prices Over the Long Run,” 85th Annual Conference of the Western Economic Association International, Vancouver, June 2009.

“Home Purchases by Foreigners in France,” an English review of L. Fauvet’s study in Études Foncières, 129, September–October 2007.

“Long-Term Home Prices and Residential Property Investment Performance in Paris During the French Franc, 1840–2001” was published in February 2002.

“Using Notaires-INSEE Home Price Indices to Manage Home Price Risk,” a report released in September 2001.

 

3. Key Insights from Research and Talks on the French Housing Market Trends

3.1. Prices and rents of homes over the long term: Presentations

Many studies and talks have looked at the French housing market to show how home prices, rents, and income levels have changed over time and how they are changing now. Here is a quick list of some important talks and papers:

  1. How home prices and rents have changed over time

“Rents, Home Prices, and Income per Household in the Long Run” (Dec year 2024)

This talk, which was given at the Paris Region Land Authority, looks at:

This speech to the French Senate was about the housing problem and how rents and home prices have changed along with family incomes. The Senate’s information mission has a video clip of this talk that you can watch.

“More Money and Rent in the Long Run” (Aug 2022)

This talk at the Inxauseta meeting in Bunus compared three different types of the rent-to-income ratio to show how cost changes over time.

3.2.  Prices of homes

“Rents, Home Prices, and Income per Household Since the 1960s,” a note about the housing crisis written for the French Senate’s information mission in January 2024.

“Home prices, rents, and the return and risk of real estate investments,” part of an IGF-CGEDD study from April 2021.

A list of books and articles about French home prices before the 1990s.

“How Home Prices Change Depending on the Number of Homes,” March 2021. If “everything else is equal,” this elasticity seems to be between -1 and -2. This means that when the number of homes goes up by 1%, their prices go down by about 1% to 2%.

“What’s Different Between Departments About the Level and Change in Home Prices from 1994 to 2018?” published in November 2019. Between 1994 and 2018, the difference in home prices between departments was 90% correlated with three factors: the specificity of the departments 06, 83, and 84, the income per family, and the weather. There was a 70% correlation between the change in home prices across departments from 2000 to 2015. The variables were the change in the number of dwellings (excluding secondary homes) net of population growth, the change in the unemployment rate, and the percentage of dwellings that were owned by the owners.

“Why Have French Home Prices Dropped So Little Since 2008? “, April 2015. The effect of the business climate on inflation. A paper that was released in the “Cahiers de l’Audap.”

“Bathroom Prices in Paris from the 1300s to 1500s: A Comparison of G. d’Avenel and S. Roux’s Series,” June 2015. In the middle of the 1400s, the Great Plague broke out at the same time that home prices in Paris dropped sharply.

“The Effects of Housing Benefits on Inflation Need to Be Evaluated,” exhibit 4.5 of this housing benefits note from July 2012, comes to mind.

A paper called “Home Prices in Paris over Eight Centuries” was released in the September 2012 issue of Variances, which is a quarterly publication for ENSAE graduates. It was written in August 2012 and was read by many people.

“What Do You Think Will Happen to Home Prices After Their Rise?,” a futures paper published by Regards croisés sur l’économie in May 2011.

“New Home Prices Vs. Apartment Prices: The Inversion of 2001,” August 2011. In France, from 1965 to 2000, both sale prices and incomes for people who lived in apartments grew more slowly than for single-family homes. Since 2001, wages have been going in the same direction, but apartment prices have been going up compared to house prices in most departments, especially in big cities and along the Mediterranean coast. It doesn’t look like this difference will last in the long term. This paper is a follow-up to “Depreciation and Pauperization of Apartments relative to Detached Houses, 1994–2002,” which was published in September 2005.

“Long-Term Home Prices,” March 2010. This paper talks about how the prices of non-property assets have changed over the last two hundred years. It also talks about how home prices have changed since the 13th century and their main properties over the last few decades, including how they relate to economic, financial, demographic, and housing aggregates. It also talks about residential property as a long-term investment, talks about the number and amount of dwelling sales, and ends with some possible futures.

Article titled “Existing Home Prices in the 2000s,” which Catherine Rougerie and I wrote together for INSEE-Première in May 2010, can be found there.

There are two short studies in the French Notaries’ quarterly property market report (2010) that look at the relationship between income and home prices in the main cities of France.

“Home Price Seasonality”: a paper that came out in Études Foncières 121, May–June 2006.

“Home Prices in 2004”: Some Historical Abnormalities,” Urbanissimo, 78, October 2004, p.

“Investments in Stocks and Homes”: Some Regularities in the Long Run,” Réflexions immobilières, 33, September 2002.

“40 years of home prices in the Region of Paris” was a talk given on October 23, 2001, at a meeting put together by the Council of the Region of Paris and the Interdepartmental Paris Chamber of Notaries.

“Long Run Home Price Evolution,” report from SES to the Ministry of Equipment in March and April 2001.

3.3. Rents

“Rents and Incomes Since the 1970s” (6 June 2013)

The INSEE rent index has grown at the same rate as the average French family income over the past 40 years. As a share of renters’ income, however, rents have increased. This trend is caused by two main things:

“Existing-Home Prices and Rents from 2000 to 2010” (May 2010)

A study in INSEE-Première by P. Gallot, E. Leprévost, and C. Rougerie looked at how home prices and rents changed during this time and showed trends and thorough analysis.

3.4. Taxes on property sales and transactions

“Long-Term Trends in Home Sales and Transaction Amounts” (April 2025)

This essay looks at long-term patterns in the number and worth of current home sales, focusing on how they have changed over time.

“Rental Brokerage Market Share Since the 1990s” (January 2021).

This working paper talks about the different ways that rental deals have been made over the years, such as through ads between people, real estate agents, and other channels.

“Existing-Home Brokerage Market Share Since 1945” (changed November 2019)

This study looks at how the market share of home deals arranged by people, real estate agents, and notaries has changed over the years.

“Number and Amount of Existing Home Sales Since 1967” (February 2015)

This paper recalculates long-term trends in home sales and transaction amounts, going back to 1967. It does this by completely revising earlier figures.

“Property Transaction Taxes and Sales Amounts, 1800–2008” (April 2009)

This study looks back at property transaction taxes over the past two hundred years, looking at how rates, earnings, and tax bases have changed.

“Ownership Changes in Existing Dwellings, 2000–2010” (August 2014)

During this time, an average of 800,000 existing homes were sold each year, if you don’t count the drops in 2008 and 2009. About 330,000 properties also changed hands through gifts, inheritances, or other means, and another 160,000 properties went through “virtual” title changes.

“Occupancy Status of Purchased or Built Dwellings” (June 7)

This report shows the number of new and used home sales broken down by occupancy type (owner-occupied, rented, additional homes, or empty) and by area, size, and type of housing for the years 2001 and 2003.

“Departments’ Property Transaction Tax Receipts: A Short-Lived Euphoria” (October year 2005)

This paper, which was published in Urbanissimo, talks about how the growth in transaction tax funds received by departments is not sustainable and stresses how short-term it is.

3.5. How housing conditions will change over time

“Housing Surveys Results for Households and Their Homes Since 1970,” May 2018. Based on analyses by occupancy status, type of dwelling, age bracket, and income bracket, this factual paper shows several long-term trends that have happened over the last few decades: more people owning their own homes, more renters living in poverty compared to owner-occupiers, more renters paying more than they earn, fewer people living in households, more square meters per person, etc.

“Fifty Years of Changes in the Housing Conditions of Families,” Données Sociales, 2006, by Alain Jacquot from INSEE.

 

3.6. Miscellaneous papers

“What are International Housing Comparisons Worth?,” by J. Friggit, was released in September 2024 as a short piece in Variances, the ENSAE Alumni Association’s website. It was based on the study “Fragility of International Housing Comparisons.”

“Twenty years of short and long-term vacancy,” September 2021, part of a talk given to the CGEDD housing college. Short-term and long-term rental openings have changed in different ways since the late 1990s. Soon after 2006, there were more empty spaces in zones A, B1, and Abis. Most of these were short-term blank spaces.

“Projection of Households’ Mortgage Debt to 2030,” August 2010. In France, home debt increased between 2000 and 2010. The expected growth depends on the factors.

“Length of Principal Residence Mortgages, 1967–2005,” May 2010. Based on INSEE’s Housing studies, the law was changed.

“Viager” Sales of Existing Homes,” February 2008. Number of “viager” sales, owners’ and buyers’ ages, sexes, and other traits, kinds of homes sold, and so on.

 

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