Local market reports › CM
Every figure on this page comes from the public record: 405,852 sales registered with HM Land Registry in the CM postcode area (Chelmsford) 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.
CM is the postcode area centred on Chelmsford, taking in 25 districts. Figures this wide smooth over big local differences, so use the district reports below for anywhere specific.
Click the map to open CM on the live map, with every sale plotted at its address. The average pricing view shades the whole country the same way.
The 2026 median in CM is £390,000, from 2,475 registered sales; the mean, £431,100, 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 CM trades 42% above the country as a whole.
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.
| Year | Median (cash) | Median (today's £) | Sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | £390,000 | £390,000 | 2,475 |
| 2025 | £405,000 | £405,000 | 11,821 |
| 2024 | £397,000 | £412,235 | 11,558 |
| 2023 | £381,000 | £408,849 | 10,808 |
| 2022 | £400,000 | £458,091 | 13,997 |
| 2021 | £380,000 | £469,892 | 16,609 |
| 2020 | £370,000 | £468,871 | 11,311 |
| 2019 | £345,000 | £441,651 | 12,395 |
| 2018 | £345,000 | £449,151 | 12,581 |
| 2017 | £340,000 | £452,896 | 12,683 |
| 2016 | £315,000 | £430,396 | 13,308 |
| 2015 | £280,000 | £386,400 | 13,712 |
| 2014 | £250,000 | £346,386 | 13,181 |
| 2013 | £238,000 | £334,460 | 10,852 |
| 2012 | £232,000 | £333,500 | 8,968 |
| 2011 | £228,000 | £336,154 | 8,930 |
| 2010 | £230,000 | £352,275 | 9,223 |
| 2009 | £208,000 | £326,553 | 8,558 |
| 2008 | £220,000 | £352,204 | 7,965 |
| 2007 | £223,000 | £369,436 | 15,932 |
| 2006 | £206,400 | £349,916 | 16,802 |
| 2005 | £195,000 | £338,917 | 13,231 |
| 2004 | £187,500 | £332,584 | 15,397 |
| 2003 | £171,000 | £307,666 | 15,038 |
| 2002 | £148,000 | £271,957 | 16,564 |
| 2001 | £122,500 | £230,000 | 16,105 |
| 2000 | £107,000 | £205,083 | 14,670 |
| 1999 | £89,600 | £174,398 | 17,122 |
| 1998 | £81,000 | £159,686 | 14,236 |
| 1997 | £74,400 | £149,016 | 15,644 |
| 1996 | £69,000 | £142,119 | 13,393 |
| 1995 | £66,000 | £140,123 | 10,783 |
In cash terms the typical CM home went from £66,000 in 1995 to £390,000 in 2026, roughly 6 times the price. Even after inflation that is a real rise of about 178%: 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 17% below that. Someone who bought at the 2021 peak has not yet seen that price back in real terms.
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 2002 (+20.8% on the year before); the weakest, 2009 (−5.5%). Single-year swings like these are why the annualised table below matters more than any one year's headline.
| Period | Cash, per year | Real terms, per year |
|---|---|---|
| 1 years (since 2025) | −3.7% | −3.7% |
| 5 years (since 2021) | +0.5% | −3.7% |
| 10 years (since 2016) | +2.2% | −1.0% |
| 20 years (since 2006) | +3.2% | +0.5% |
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.
Recorded sales per year. The dip after 2008 is the financial crisis; the last bar is still filling in as recent sales get registered.
Monthly registrations. The sawtooth is seasonal; the register runs weeks behind completions at the right-hand edge.
CM recorded 9,002 sales in the last twelve months of data. Like most of England and Wales, turnover never fully recovered from 2008: the market here averaged 15,467 sales a year before the financial crisis and 10,132 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.
CM falls under Brentwood, the local authority covering most of the CM area (parts fall under Harlow and Chelmsford, where rents differ), where the ONS puts the average private rent at £1,613 a month (May 2026 figures). A one-bed averages £1,102 a month here and a four-or-more-bed £2,402, so size does most of the work in setting the rent.
ONS Price Index of Private Rents, May 2026.
Set against the £390,000 median sold price, £1,613 a month is £19,356 a year, a gross yield of 5.0%: 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.
Nobody can tell you that, and this page will not pretend to. What the record shows: the median is up 3% over five years in cash but down 17% 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.
The spread across the CM area is the point: the same five years treated these districts very differently.
The biggest risers and fallers in cash terms; every row links to that district's report.
The area medians above hide a lot. Here is every CM district with enough sales to measure, dearest first; each links to its own full report.
| District | Median (2026) | 5-year | Sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| CM4 Blackmore, Fryerning | £749,500 | +16% | 33 |
| CM16 Epping, Theydon Bois | £535,000 | -6% | 61 |
| CM13 Brentwood, East Horndon | £530,000 | +13% | 67 |
| CM5 Chipping Ongar, High Ongar | £507,500 | +4% | 34 |
| CM15 Brentwood, Doddinghurst | £493,800 | -2% | 80 |
| CM22 Bishop's Stortford, Sheering | £475,000 | +0% | 38 |
| CM11 Billericay (East), Great Burstead | £455,000 | +0% | 55 |
| CM12 Billericay (West), Little Burstead | £443,000 | -7% | 95 |
| CM77 Braintree, Great Notley | £440,000 | +14% | 58 |
| CM6 Great Dunmow, Felsted | £435,000 | +2% | 111 |
| CM21 Sawbridgeworth | £427,000 | +8% | 41 |
| CM23 Bishop's Stortford, Thorley | £425,000 | +2% | 161 |
| CM3 Hatfield Peverel, South Woodham Ferrers | £410,000 | -1% | 194 |
| CM24 Stansted Mountfitchet, Stansted Airport | £395,000 | -1% | 39 |
| CM14 Brentwood, Warley | £385,000 | +0% | 86 |
| CM17 Harlow, Old Harlow | £385,000 | +0% | 121 |
| CM1 Chelmsford, Writtle | £375,000 | +4% | 235 |
| CM2 Chelmsford | £370,000 | +6% | 239 |
| CM9 Maldon, Tollesbury | £362,500 | +5% | 113 |
| CM19 Harlow, Roydon | £340,000 | +13% | 39 |
| CM0 | £325,000 | -5% | 76 |
| CM18 Harlow | £325,000 | +16% | 82 |
| CM20 Harlow, Gilston | £322,500 | +14% | 70 |
| CM7 Braintree, Finchingfield | £308,200 | +4% | 212 |
| CM8 Witham | £300,000 | +2% | 135 |
See every individual CM sale on the live map, mapped to the exact address, or the quick-reference CM price page. The report tool writes a custom answer to a specific question, and the mortgage and rent calculator on any sale runs the numbers on a real purchase.
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.