Local market reports › LU area › LU5
Bidwell market report LU5, Dunstable
The standing LU5 (Bidwell) property market report, rebuilt from the full public record every month. Everything below comes from 22,609 sales recorded by HM Land Registry in LU5 (Dunstable) since 1995, real completion prices from real purchases, alongside the ONS's current rent figures. No valuations, no estimates, no asking prices.
Sales recorded to August 2026; rents are ONS figures for May 2026. The page rebuilds with each monthly release. Page updated 19 October 2026.
In short: the middle 2026 sale in LU5 (Dunstable) came in at £320,000, out of 240 registered, up 7% on five years earlier, and the mean stands at £327,800, and by floor area homes here have averaged about £3,930 per square metre over the last five years. The record behind it is 22,609 completed sales lodged with HM Land Registry since 1995, monthly refreshed, with no valuations or asking prices anywhere in the figures.
The postcode district LU5 covering Bidwell, Chalgrave, Fancott sits in Dunstable. A district is the workhorse unit for reading a market: local enough to be meaningful, busy enough that the medians rest on a steady flow of sales.
Where LU5 sits
Shaded by median price on the same scale as the average prices map. Click any shape to open it on the live map with every sale plotted at its address, or zoom in past street level to see the sold homes right here.
LU5 sold prices: where the market stands
In the LU5 property market, the 2026 median sale price is £320,000, from 240 registered sales; the mean, the "average house price" most sites quote, is £327,800, sitting almost on top of it, so sales bunch tightly around the typical price.
Price per square metre in LU5
By floor space, homes in LU5 have sold for about £3,930 per square metre on average over the last five years: the like-for-like measure that lets you compare a small flat with a large house, from the Energy Performance Certificate floor areas behind each sale.
For scale: the England and Wales median is £285,000, so LU5 trades 12% above the country as a whole.
LU5's median sold price, 1995 to 2026
One line records the median as paid; the other restates every year in today's money via ONS CPIH, the honest measure of getting dearer. Hover for year figures, click the legend to isolate a line.
See this chart as a table
| Year | Median (cash) | Median (today's £) | Sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | £320,000 | £320,000 | 240 |
| 2025 | £345,000 | £353,250 | 776 |
| 2024 | £346,800 | £368,720 | 700 |
| 2023 | £342,500 | £376,324 | 665 |
| 2022 | £337,000 | £395,171 | 935 |
| 2021 | £300,000 | £379,839 | 959 |
| 2020 | £273,000 | £354,223 | 572 |
| 2019 | £255,000 | £334,244 | 598 |
| 2018 | £275,000 | £366,580 | 600 |
| 2017 | £251,000 | £342,339 | 676 |
| 2016 | £230,000 | £321,772 | 770 |
| 2015 | £188,000 | £265,644 | 672 |
| 2014 | £179,000 | £253,943 | 676 |
| 2013 | £162,000 | £233,102 | 560 |
| 2012 | £163,000 | £239,916 | 420 |
| 2011 | £160,000 | £241,538 | 398 |
| 2010 | £160,000 | £250,921 | 370 |
| 2009 | £143,000 | £229,874 | 367 |
| 2008 | £162,000 | £265,552 | 401 |
| 2007 | £163,000 | £276,493 | 1,001 |
| 2006 | £150,000 | £260,381 | 1,007 |
| 2005 | £145,000 | £258,042 | 772 |
| 2004 | £135,500 | £246,094 | 911 |
| 2003 | £125,000 | £230,280 | 885 |
| 2002 | £108,000 | £203,201 | 1,005 |
| 2001 | £85,000 | £163,408 | 1,049 |
| 2000 | £77,000 | £151,113 | 807 |
| 1999 | £65,000 | £129,542 | 945 |
| 1998 | £60,000 | £121,114 | 842 |
| 1997 | £53,000 | £108,692 | 821 |
| 1996 | £48,000 | £101,230 | 677 |
| 1995 | £49,000 | £106,518 | 532 |
In cash terms the typical LU5 home went from £49,000 in 1995 to £320,000 in 2026, roughly 7 times the price. Adjusted for inflation it still comes to a real rise of roughly 200%, so homes here got dearer in substance, not only in cash. Measured in today's money the market peaked in 2022; the current median sits about 19% below that. Someone who bought at the 2022 peak has not yet seen that price back in real terms.
Year-on-year change in the LU5 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 2002 (+27.1% on the year before); the weakest, 2009 (−11.7%). Single-year swings like these are why the annualised table below matters more than any one year's headline.
Detached, semi, terraced, flat: four markets in one
A single median hides the split beneath it. Sales of terraced homes dominate the record here, 35% of the typed total. A detached home currently trades at £450,000 against £184,000 for a flat, 2.4 times the price.
Median by property type, LU5
One line per type, years with too few sales omitted. Hover for the year's figures; click a legend entry to isolate a type.
| Type | Median (2026) | Sales that year | All-time sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| Detached | £450,000 | 37 | 3,367 |
| Semi-detached | £347,500 | 84 | 7,910 |
| Terraced | £298,000 | 81 | 7,991 |
| Flats | £184,000 | 38 | 3,341 |
Annualised returns
| Period | Cash, per year | Real terms, per year |
|---|---|---|
| 1 year (since 2025) | −7.2% | −9.4% |
| 5 years (since 2021) | +1.3% | −3.4% |
| 6 years (since 2020) | +2.7% | −1.7% |
| 10 years (since 2016) | +3.4% | −0.1% |
| 20 years (since 2006) | +3.9% | +1.0% |
The table annualises median growth over each period, with the real column deflated by ONS CPIH. Smoothing hides the cycle (see the chart above for it), and none of this forecasts: it is the record.
The turnover behind the prices
Sales per year, counted
Annual recorded sales. The post-2008 trough is the financial crisis; treat the final bar as provisional while registrations catch up.
Month by month, five years back
Sales as they reached the register each month. Expect the seasonal sawtooth, and discount the newest months while late entries land.
Over the last twelve months of data, 465 sales completed in LU5. Like most of England and Wales, turnover never fully recovered from 2008: the market here averaged 930 sales a year before the financial crisis and 663 a year over the last five. Watch the volume as closely as the price. Thin years make jumpy medians, where one street's sales can move the figure, and the newest year is always incomplete because registrations trail completions by weeks or months.
What homes rent for around LU5
LU5 falls under Central Bedfordshire, where the ONS puts the average private rent at £1,247 a month (May 2026 figures). Size sets most of the rent: one-beds average £862 a month here against £2,039 for four or more bedrooms.
Average monthly rent by size, Central Bedfordshire
ONS Price Index of Private Rents, May 2026.
£1,247 a month is £14,964 a year, which against the £320,000 median sold price makes a gross yield of 4.7%. Gross means before letting costs, voids, maintenance and tax: treat it as a ceiling. The ONS publishes rents by local authority, so neighbouring districts under the same authority share these numbers.
Asked and answered: LU5 (Bidwell)
Are property prices falling in LU5 (Bidwell)?
Is LU5 (Bidwell) a good place to buy a house?
How much did a house sell for in LU5 (Bidwell)?
Where do LU5 prices go next?
Prediction is not this page's business. Its business is the record, which says: the median is up 7% over five years in cash but down 16% after inflation. Read the volume chart with the price chart before acting on either, remembering that registrations trail the deals themselves by weeks.
What you could buy in LU5 now
Everything above is what homes in LU5 sold for. Turning to what is actually available: 9 homes on the market right now, from 2 agents publishing to HomesIndex, at a typical asking price 25% above the LU5 median sold price.
Set against 465 registered sales in the last twelve months, the 9 homes on the market here are roughly a week of supply at last year's pace, and more in reality, since only agents who publish to HomesIndex are counted. That is a thin shelf: buyers here are choosing from little, and a well priced home is unlikely to wait long.
22% of what is on the market here is asking below what comparable homes actually sold for. Every listing is measured against recent recorded sales of similar nearby homes.
- Frenchmans Close, Toddington, Bedfordshire, Toddington
- Glebe Gardens, Harlington, Bedfordshire, Harlington
"Under comparable sales" means the asking price sits below what similar homes nearby actually fetched. Treat it as the start of a conversation, never a valuation, and always view the home.
See every LU5 home for sale on the map →
Refreshed every Monday and Thursday from agents' own feeds to HomesIndex, so a sample of the market rather than all of it. An asking price remains an ask, not a sale.
When homes in LU5 change hands
June is when LU5 changes hands most (11.4% of the 4,035 sales dated 2021 to 2025); May is the quiet end at 5.9%. That is a marked seasonal rhythm. A sale completes weeks after it is agreed, so the busy month reflects deals struck earlier in the year; a seller who wants competition should be on the market ahead of it.
Sales by month, 2021 to 2025
| Month | Sales | Share |
|---|---|---|
| January | 252 | 6.2% |
| February | 354 | 8.8% |
| March | 441 | 10.9% |
| April | 270 | 6.7% |
| May | 240 | 5.9% |
| June | 460 | 11.4% |
| July | 249 | 6.2% |
| August | 339 | 8.4% |
| September | 430 | 10.7% |
| October | 322 | 8.0% |
| November | 324 | 8.0% |
| December | 354 | 8.8% |
Bedroom by bedroom: LU prices by size
The Land Registry record, split by size: what each kind of home actually sold for across the LU area. How much a size step costs is a local fact: the third-bedroom premium runs from about a quarter to nearly four fifths depending on the area, and national rules of thumb miss it.
| Type | 1 bed | 2 bed | 3 bed | 4 bed | 5 bed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Detached | £307,000 | £360,000 (+17%) | £410,000 (+14%) | £500,000 (+22%) | £645,000 (+29%) |
| Semi-detached | £265,000 | £305,000 (+15%) | £350,000 (+15%) | £400,000 (+14%) | £470,000 (+18%) |
| Terraced | £228,000 | £275,000 (+21%) | £307,500 (+12%) | £345,000 (+12%) | £405,000 (+17%) |
| Flat | £145,000 | £193,000 (+33%) | £220,500 (+14%) | — | — |
Four years of recorded sales, split by built form and bedroom count. The register does not state bedrooms, so sizes come from each home's EPC record and a few homes will land one size out. Where too few homes exist to say anything meaningful, the cell is blank.
The risers and the fallers
LU5 ranks 5 of 7 in the LU area on five-year growth. The gap between the top and bottom of this chart is the difference between buying well and buying badly in the same city.
Five-year change in the median, LU area districts
Cash-terms risers and fallers across the area; click any row for that district's full report.
Inside LU5, sector by sector
Below district level sit the sectors, street groups with reports of their own, and the gaps between neighbouring ones can be sharp.
How LU5 compares nearby
Same city, different markets. The neighbouring districts of the LU area, dearest first:
| District | Median | 5-year |
|---|---|---|
| LU7 | £365,500 | +6% |
| LU6 | £360,000 | +13% |
| LU2 | £334,000 | +17% |
| LU3 | £325,000 | +16% |
| LU5 (this report) | £320,000 | +7% |
| LU4 | £315,000 | +19% |
| LU1 | £268,000 | -4% |
Before you sell in LU5: what the record supports
Ground the asking price in real sold prices first. The average prices map gives a rough value in a minute: start at LU5's shading and zoom to the sold homes on the street itself. Agents work from this same Land Registry record when they value; this page puts it in front of you before they arrive.
Take it further
The AI answers from the same Land Registry data this report is built on, already scoped to LU5. Free after a one click sign in.
The live map plots every individual LU5 sale at its exact address, and the average prices map zooms from neighbourhood shading to single homes. For a specific question, the report tool writes a custom answer, and any sale's mortgage and rent calculator runs the numbers on a real purchase.
About the numbers: everything is computed from HM Land Registry Price Paid Data (Crown copyright, OGL v3.0), geocoded to the address; today's-money figures use the ONS CPIH index, and rents are the ONS Price Index of Private Rents by local authority. These are medians of recorded sales, not valuations, and none of it is financial advice.