Local market reports › SE area › SE23 › SE23 3
Forest Hill market report SE23 3, London
The standing SE23 3 (Forest Hill) property market report, rebuilt from the full public record every month. This page is built from the public record and nothing else: 6,425 completed sales registered with HM Land Registry in SE23 3 (London) since 1995, plus current ONS rental figures. There are no valuations, estimates or asking prices in it.
Sales data to 2026. Rents: ONS, May 2026. Regenerated with every monthly data refresh.
In short: the middle 2026 sale in SE23 3 (London) came in at £460,000, out of 61 registered, down 6% on five years earlier, and the mean stands at £600,100, and by floor area homes here have averaged about £6,840 per square metre over the last five years. The record behind it is 6,425 completed sales lodged with HM Land Registry since 1995, monthly refreshed, with no valuations or asking prices anywhere in the figures.
SE23 3 is one sector of SE23 (London): a handful of streets, and the most local view the sold record can give. The price of that locality is lumpier charts, because each year's median rests on fewer sales.
Where SE23 3 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.
SE23 3 sold prices: where the market stands
The SE23 3 median stands at £460,000 for 2026, built from 61 registered sales; the mean, the figure usually quoted as the "average house price", is £600,100, well above it, the signature of a heavy top tail: a handful of expensive sales lifting the average.
What a square metre costs in SE23 3
Measured by floor area, the last five years of SE23 3 sales average about £6,840 per square metre. Price per square metre is the fair way to compare a one-bed flat with a four-bed house, and it comes from the Energy Performance Certificate on each sold home.
England and Wales as a whole trade at a £285,000 median, leaving SE23 3 61% above the national figure.
A typical SE23 3 home, priced year by year (1995 to 2026)
The cash median beside its inflation-adjusted twin (ONS CPIH). The adjusted line answers the harder question, whether homes really got dearer. Hover for the figures; the legend toggles each series.
See this chart as a table
| Year | Median (cash) | Median (today's £) | Sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | £460,000 | £460,000 | 61 |
| 2025 | £462,200 | £473,253 | 178 |
| 2024 | £477,800 | £508,000 | 152 |
| 2023 | £430,000 | £472,465 | 133 |
| 2022 | £482,200 | £565,435 | 198 |
| 2021 | £490,000 | £620,403 | 241 |
| 2020 | £450,000 | £583,884 | 151 |
| 2019 | £430,000 | £563,627 | 155 |
| 2018 | £398,200 | £530,808 | 146 |
| 2017 | £450,000 | £613,755 | 162 |
| 2016 | £415,000 | £580,589 | 179 |
| 2015 | £380,000 | £536,940 | 193 |
| 2014 | £350,000 | £496,536 | 253 |
| 2013 | £275,000 | £395,698 | 211 |
| 2012 | £272,500 | £401,086 | 154 |
| 2011 | £242,500 | £366,082 | 145 |
| 2010 | £266,600 | £418,097 | 157 |
| 2009 | £230,000 | £369,727 | 110 |
| 2008 | £235,000 | £385,215 | 125 |
| 2007 | £240,000 | £407,107 | 266 |
| 2006 | £210,000 | £364,533 | 298 |
| 2005 | £183,000 | £325,666 | 211 |
| 2004 | £170,000 | £308,753 | 277 |
| 2003 | £166,200 | £306,181 | 278 |
| 2002 | £146,000 | £274,698 | 306 |
| 2001 | £120,000 | £230,694 | 276 |
| 2000 | £105,000 | £206,063 | 247 |
| 1999 | £80,000 | £159,436 | 282 |
| 1998 | £71,500 | £144,328 | 286 |
| 1997 | £61,000 | £125,099 | 267 |
| 1996 | £57,000 | £120,210 | 195 |
| 1995 | £60,000 | £130,431 | 132 |
In cash terms the typical SE23 3 home went from £60,000 in 1995 to £460,000 in 2026, roughly 8 times the price. Inflation explains only part of it: in today's money the rise is still about 253%, a genuine increase in what a home here costs. In inflation-adjusted terms the high-water mark was 2021. The market now sits about 26% below it, so a peak-time purchase has yet to recover its real value.
Year-on-year change in the SE23 3 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 2000 (+31.3% on the year before); the weakest, 2018 (−11.5%). Single-year swings like these are why the annualised table below matters more than any one year's headline.
The long view: annualised growth
| Period | Cash, per year | Real terms, per year |
|---|---|---|
| 1 years (since 2025) | −0.5% | −2.8% |
| 5 years (since 2021) | −1.3% | −5.8% |
| 10 years (since 2016) | +1.0% | −2.3% |
| 20 years (since 2006) | +4.0% | +1.2% |
Each row is compound annual growth of the median; ONS CPIH supplies the real-terms deflator. Annualising irons out the cycle, which the chart above shows in full, and past growth records what happened rather than predicting anything.
How many homes change hands in SE23 3
The year-by-year sales count
Each bar is a year's recorded sales. 2008's dip is the financial crisis, and the newest bar always grows for a while as late registrations arrive.
Over the last twelve months of data, 61 sales completed in SE23 3. Like most of England and Wales, turnover never fully recovered from 2008: the market here averaged 270 sales a year before the financial crisis and 144 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.
The rental side of SE23 3
SE23 3 falls under Lewisham, where the ONS puts the average private rent at £1,821 a month (May 2026 figures). A one-bed averages £1,450 a month here and a four-or-more-bed £2,705, so size does most of the work in setting the rent.
Average monthly rent by size, Lewisham
ONS Price Index of Private Rents, May 2026.
Set against the £460,000 median sold price, £1,821 a month is £21,852 a year, a gross yield of 4.8%: 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.
How SE23 3 trades
The record here is jumpy: year-on-year moves of ten per cent or more are common in the chart above, mostly a function of which homes happened to sell rather than the market lurching. Against the SE23 district median, SE23 3 sits 8% lower, marking it as a cheaper pocket of the district.
Asked and answered: SE23 3 (Forest Hill)
Are property prices falling in SE23 3 (Forest Hill)?
Is SE23 3 (Forest Hill) a good place to buy a house?
How much did a house sell for in SE23 3 (Forest Hill)?
What happens to SE23 3 prices now?
The record answers a different question than "what happens next": the median is down 6% over five years in cash but down 26% after inflation. Put the volume chart beside the price chart before drawing conclusions, and allow for the register's lag behind actual completions.
What is for sale in SE23 right now
This is what you could actually buy today: 42 homes currently on the market from 8 agents publishing to HomesIndex.
These cover the whole SE23 district, not just SE23 3: live asking prices are collected per district.
Of everything listed here, 31% asks less than the sold record of comparable homes. Each listing is compared with recent recorded sales of similar homes nearby.
"Under comparable sales" compares each asking price with what similar homes nearby actually sold for. It is a starting point for a conversation, not a valuation. Always look at the home itself.
See every SE23 home for sale on the map →
Live asking prices from estate agents who publish a feed to HomesIndex, refreshed every Monday and Thursday: a sample of the market, not every home for sale. Asking prices are not sale prices.
Moving up a bedroom in SE: the cost
What homes of each size actually sold for across the SE area, from the Land Registry record. 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 | — | £516,250 | £795,000 (+54%) | £1,325,000 (+67%) | £2,025,000 (+53%) |
| Semi-detached | £375,000 | £480,000 (+28%) | £613,025 (+28%) | £870,000 (+42%) | £1,390,000 (+60%) |
| Terraced | £405,000 | £475,000 (+17%) | £630,000 (+33%) | £878,697 (+39%) | £1,275,000 (+45%) |
| Flat | £345,000 | £465,000 (+35%) | £645,000 (+39%) | £885,000 (+37%) | — |
Built from the last four years of recorded sales by form and bedroom count. Bedroom counts are estimated from EPC records (the register carries none), so expect a small number of homes one size adrift. Blank cells mean too few homes for the figure to mean anything.
The risers and the fallers
The spread across the SE area is the point: the same five years treated these districts very differently.
SE area districts: five years of change
Cash-terms risers and fallers across the area; click any row for that district's full report.
Other sectors in SE23
Prices can differ sharply between two sectors a few minutes' walk apart. The rest of SE23, each linking to its own report:
| Sector | Median (latest) | Sales that year |
|---|---|---|
| SE23 1 | £527,500 | 36 |
| SE23 2 | £500,000 | 58 |
Zoom out to the full SE23 district report for the type split, monthly volumes and how SE23 compares with its neighbours.
Before you sell in SE23 3: what the record supports
Start from what homes here actually sold for, not an estimate. Before booking a house valuation or flat valuation in SE23 3, use the average prices map for a rough value: zoom from SE23 3's shading down to the sold homes on your own street. The figures above are every recorded SE23 3 sale; agents price with this same Land Registry record, and now you have it too.
Local estate agents: one agent per district gets the featured spot on this report, free for founding agents. Claim SE23 3.
Dig further
Behind the answers sits the same Land Registry record as this page, with SE23 3 already set as the subject. Free, one click sign in.
Two maps carry on from here: every SE23 3 sale at its exact address, and the average prices map from area shading down to single homes. The report tool answers a specific question in writing, and each sale's mortgage and rent calculator prices 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.