Every figure on this page comes from the public record: 197,946 sales registered with HM Land Registry in the BL postcode area (Bolton) since 1995, each one a completed purchase at a real price, plus current rental figures from the ONS. Nothing here is a valuation, an estimate or an asking price.
Sales data to May 2026. Rents: ONS, May 2026. Regenerated with every monthly data refresh.
BL is the postcode area centred on Bolton, taking in 10 districts. Figures this wide smooth over big local differences, so use the district reports below for anywhere specific.
Where BL sits
Click the map to open BL on the live map, with every sale plotted at its address. The average pricing view shades the whole country the same way.
£199,200median sold price, 2026
+17%five-year change (cash)
4,790sales in the last 12 months
5.3%gross rental yield (est.)
What a home in BL sells for
The 2026 median in BL is £199,200, from 1,316 registered sales; the mean, £227,700, sits modestly above it, the usual shape of a market with an expensive tail.
For scale: the England and Wales median is £274,000, so BL trades 27% below the country as a whole.
The price of a typical BL home, 1995 to 2026
The median as recorded at the time, and each year restated in today's money (ONS CPIH), the sharper test of whether homes really got dearer. Hover for the year-by-year figures; click a legend entry to isolate a series.
Price at the timeIn today's money (CPIH)
See this chart as a table
Year
Median (cash)
Median (today's £)
Sales
2026
£199,200
£199,200
1,316
2025
£201,500
£201,500
6,085
2024
£195,000
£202,483
6,045
2023
£175,000
£187,792
5,601
2022
£180,000
£206,141
7,004
2021
£170,000
£210,215
7,983
2020
£150,000
£190,083
5,871
2019
£140,000
£179,221
6,551
2018
£137,000
£178,358
6,492
2017
£131,000
£174,498
7,218
2016
£130,000
£177,624
6,517
2015
£125,000
£172,500
5,807
2014
£119,500
£165,572
5,595
2013
£115,000
£161,609
4,463
2012
£115,000
£165,313
3,585
2011
£110,000
£162,179
3,825
2010
£118,000
£180,733
3,558
2009
£117,500
£184,471
3,423
2008
£120,000
£192,111
4,262
2007
£125,000
£207,083
8,302
2006
£118,000
£200,049
7,887
2005
£108,000
£187,708
6,923
2004
£94,000
£166,735
8,842
2003
£73,000
£131,343
8,800
2002
£60,000
£110,253
9,386
2001
£55,000
£103,265
8,336
2000
£50,000
£95,833
7,063
1999
£49,000
£95,374
6,940
1998
£45,000
£88,714
6,428
1997
£45,000
£90,131
6,415
1996
£41,600
£85,684
6,020
1995
£41,200
£87,471
5,403
In cash terms the typical BL home went from £41,200 in 1995 to £199,200 in 2026, roughly 5 times the price. Even after inflation that is a real rise of about 128%: homes here genuinely became dearer, not just more expensive on paper. Measured in today's money the market peaked in 2021; the current median sits about 5% below that. Someone who bought at the 2021 peak has not yet seen that price back in real terms.
Year-on-year change in the BL median
Each bar is the change on the year before, in cash. The zero line is the boundary between rising and falling.
The strongest year on record here is 2004 (+28.8% on the year before); the weakest, 2011 (−6.8%). Single-year swings like these are why the annualised table below matters more than any one year's headline.
Annualised returns
Period
Cash, per year
Real terms, per year
1 years (since 2025)
−1.1%
−1.1%
5 years (since 2021)
+3.2%
−1.1%
10 years (since 2016)
+4.4%
+1.2%
20 years (since 2006)
+2.7%
0.0%
Compound annual growth of the median sold price; the real column deflates by ONS CPIH. Annualised figures smooth the cycle (the chart above shows the cycle), and past growth is a record, not a forecast.
Transaction volumes
How many homes change hands
Recorded sales per year. The dip after 2008 is the financial crisis; the last bar is still filling in as recent sales get registered.
The last five years, month by month
Monthly registrations. The sawtooth is seasonal; the register runs weeks behind completions at the right-hand edge.
BL recorded 4,790 sales in the last twelve months of data. Like most of England and Wales, turnover never fully recovered from 2008: the market here averaged 8,192 sales a year before the financial crisis and 5,210 a year over the last five. Volume matters as much as price: when few homes change hands, the median gets jumpy and a single street can move the figure. The most recent year is always still filling in, because sales appear in the Land Registry weeks or months after completion.
What homes rent for around BL
BL falls under Bolton, the local authority covering most of the BL area (parts fall under Bury, where rents differ), where the ONS puts the average private rent at £883 a month (May 2026 figures). A one-bed averages £646 a month here and a four-or-more-bed £1,433, so size does most of the work in setting the rent.
Average monthly rent by size, Bolton
ONS Price Index of Private Rents, May 2026.
Set against the £199,200 median sold price, £883 a month is £10,596 a year, a gross yield of 5.3%: gross, before letting costs, voids, maintenance and tax, so a ceiling rather than a promise. Rents are published at local-authority level, so nearby districts in the same authority share these figures.
Will BL prices rise from here?
Nobody can tell you that, and this page will not pretend to. What the record shows: the median is up 17% over five years in cash but down 5% after inflation. If you are weighing a purchase, read the volume chart alongside the price one, and remember that every figure here is a completed sale, lagged by the weeks it takes the Land Registry to register it.
Ladders and snakes: five-year risers and fallers
The spread across the BL area is the point: the same five years treated these districts very differently.
Five-year change in the median, BL area districts
The biggest risers and fallers in cash terms; every row links to that district's report.
District by district
The area medians above hide a lot. Here is every BL district with enough sales to measure, dearest first; each links to its own full report.
How this page is made: the statistics are computed from HM Land Registry Price Paid Data (Crown copyright, OGL v3.0), geocoded to address level; inflation adjustment uses the ONS CPIH index; rents are the ONS Price Index of Private Rents at local-authority level. Medians of recorded sales, not valuations. Nothing on this page is financial advice.