Increasing house prices and sales suggest France’s property market is recovering from its extended slump, but caution is advised.
This is the takeaway from the latest publication of house sale data from French notaires.
The data is the most comprehensive in France as it covers all non-new build homes (flats and houses) across the country.
Due to the time it takes to compile this information, it publishes information relating to two quarters previous, so the most recent data goes up to the end of March 2025.
However, the publication also carries estimates from more recent data as well as information about new builds, mortgages, and other areas to produce a detailed picture of the market.
Below, we review five key points.
1: The French property market is making a comeback...
Between April 2024 and April 2025, 892,000 properties in France were sold, breaking a long downward trend in falling numbers.
This is 50,000 more than the period between September 2023 and September 2024, and initial figures point towards numbers continuing to rise.
While it is lower than the pre-Covid peak (just over 1 million properties sold between January 2019 - January 2020), it is higher than given pre-2016 figures.
In addition, prices are now also seeing growth after several quarters of falling figures.
Between the first quarters (January 1 - March 31) of 2024 and 2025, prices nationwide rose by an average of 0.4%, up to 0.7% if excluding the capital region (where prices still continued to fall).
Taken in isolation, prices rose by around 1% in the first quarter of 2025 alone, indicating sustained growth could be on its way.
2: …but caution is advised
However, buyers and sellers alike are advised to be cautious.
“The real estate market has entered a transition phase, supported by monetary adjustments but still weakened by an uncertain economic and geopolitical context,” say the notaires.
The above data “confirms the start of a consolidation phase, without yet signalling a clear recovery.”
Early forecasts show between July 2024 - July 2025, year-on-year price increases could reach 2.1% for flats, but only 0.5% for homes, seeing prices potentially stall and limit further increases before 2026.
The higher figure for flats may be due to their greater numbers than houses in more dynamic city centres.
“International trade tensions, financial market volatility, and slowing growth in Europe are maintaining a wait-and-see attitude among households,” say notaires, and recent data showing a fall in household confidence underlies this position.
Finally, the long-term effects of rising notaire fees on property purchases is uncertain, and may further impact the market’s progress or regression.
3: Some cities see major price rise, others falls
Individually, certain cities saw prices increase by nearly 10% between January/March 2024 and January/March 2025.
For houses this includes Poitiers (+8%) and Troyes (+5.6%), and for flats Nîmes (+9.1%) and Caen (+7%).
However, several cities saw prices fall in the same period, including in larger urban areas.
For houses this includes Lyon (-4.3%), Nantes (-4.1%), and Toulouse (-2.3%), but was also more pronounced for flats, where larger drops were recorded in Amiens (-6.8%), Limoges -5.8%) and Bordeaux (-6.6%, where a -4.7% drop in house prices was also recorded).
“The market remains heterogeneous: some metropolitan areas and coastal regions are seeing a moderate revival, while rural areas and some medium-sized towns are struggling to halt the decline in prices and transactions,” say notaires.
Compared to previous reports an increasing number of cities are seeing year-on-year price increases, and price drops are becoming smaller in scale.
4: Variation for coastal cities
Notaires usually focus on house prices in major cities and population areas, however once a year the also look at changing rates in coastal cities.
In the most recent report, it looked at year-on-year prices for between April 2024 and April 2025.
A wide variation was recorded – for example, house prices increased by +12.3% in Le Touquet (Hauts-de-France) and +14.3% in Trouville-sur-Mer (Normandy) - but fell by -5.9% in Boulogne-sur-Mer and -4.9% in Cherbourg in the same regions.
Brittany performed poorly, with drops recorded in essentially all coastal areas including Saint-Malo (houses -9.9%, flats -5.1%), Brignogan-Plage (flats -8.8%), Ploemeur (houses -2.8%; flats -2.1%).
Only flats in Concarneau (+2.1%) saw an increase in cost in the Brittany region.
Price drops also extended to the nearby Atlantic coastal towns of Pornic (houses -6.5%, flats -6%) and Saint-Hilaire-de-Riez (houses -0.7%, flats -2.6%).
Some growth was noted in Mediterranean cities although this was marred by falls in many well-known destinations including Antibes and Menton.
5: Mortgage rates remain steady
Cuts in key interest rates by the European Central Bank have filtered down with mortgage interest rates at around 3%.
However, “this improvement remains moderate due to the 10-year French government bond rate, which remains at around 3.2%,” say notaires, which is “limiting the manoeuvring room of banking institutions.”
In addition, a lack of support for first-time buyers is also restricting the market’s ability to bounce back as banks remain wary of lending to this group.
Mortgage rates may need to fall further or more support to be given to first-time buyers to help further spur the market.
Despite this, real estate purchasing power (the number of square metres that a household can afford to buy) increased to 78m² in 2024, up from 75m² in 2023.
Early estimates for 2025 see this rise to up 85m², the same as in 2021.
