In Toulouse, real estate purchasing power is on the decline
The attractiveness of the province is pushing up housing prices and real estate purchasing power, weighed down by the crisis, has fallen in most cities since 2019. Limited trend for the Pink City where you can still buy yourself 72 m2 accommodation for 266,800 euros, the average price of accommodation in France.
Equality does not exist in real estate. For 266,800 €, the average price of (old) housing in France in 2021, you can buy a 72 m apartment.2 In Toulouse. A large T3 or a small T4! This is much more than in Paris, where this sum only gives the right to a studio (23 m2), but much less than in Saint-Etienne, where one can apparently acquire a “palace of 179 m2 for the same amount! But apart from football (and again, it’s not what it used to be), why would you go buy, or invest, in the town of Allez les Verts?
Real estate purchasing power in decline for 2 years
The purchasing power of real estate varies depending on the city (see opposite). It also varies over time, following fluctuations in house prices. According to the last two LPI barometers, the average price of a property in the old building has risen from € 251,000 in 2019 to € 265,500 in 2020 and then to € 266,800 in 2021. A significant increase in two years. The “purchasable” surface, suddenly, is reduced like the skin of grief. Some examples of the erosion that has affected real estate purchasing power over the past two years: for a m2 lost since 2019 in Paris, Lyon or Saint-Etienne or 2m2 less in Rennes or Le Havre, on the account 4 m² lost in two years in Nice, Lille, Toulon or Montpellier, 5 m2 in Strasbourg, 6 m2 in Nantes and even 11 m2 lost in Reims, where prices have soared, the price of success, no doubt, for this quiet city taken from Parisians in search of calm (and champagne?) near the capital .
According to the LPI barometer, the purchasable surface area would have increased in Bordeaux (1 m² gained in 2 years), where prices had reached such highs that they must have stabilized, or in Marseille (5 m² gained). While we observe a stability of real estate purchasing power in the Pink City.
Prices that will increase in disparate fashion
But according to the real estate site Meilleurtaux, the decline in real estate purchasing power has also affected Toulouse. The mortgage broker scrutinized 20 cities in France, no longer based on the average price of a home but on the average loan per acquisition. A way perhaps more concrete and meaningful than the price of housing. With a borrowing capacity of 223,896 euros (average budget for cases handled by Meilleurtaux), you can only buy 60 m in Toulouse.2 in 2021 against 64 m2 in 2019. That is 4 m2 lost. The equivalent of a balcony or a toilet … This remains however much less important than in some medium-sized towns such as Toulon (which loses 10 m2), Reims (-13 m2) or even Angers, where real estate purchasing power has dropped by 27 m² since the end of 2019, the equivalent of a studio! With the strong demand in favor of medium-sized towns and provincial metropolises, property prices have demanded listings again.
For now, credit rates are still low, but buying a home is getting more and more expensive. And if inflation makes a comeback, as many analysts fear …
For 266,800 euros, you have less and less
The purchasing power of real estate depends on the income of families but also on the price of real estate, which varies enormously from one city to another. Thus, for 266,800 euros, the average budget dedicated by the French to the purchase of real estate in the old in 2021 according to the LPI-Se Loger barometer, on a 49 m² in Lyon, 54 m² in Bordeaux, 57 m2 in Nice, 62 m² in Nantes and 67 m2 in Rennes, i.e. less than in Toulouse (72 m2). But you can buy with this sum 73 m² in Lille, 77 m² in Montpellier, 82 m² in Marseille, 92 m² in Grenoble or 99 m² in Toulon… According to the LPI-SeLoger barometer, a specialized site which measured the prices of the real estate in cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants in France, the difference is even from 1 to almost 8 between the surface area purchasable with the same amount between the capital and Saint-Etienne. The average property price in France is 3,423 euros per m2 in 2021, according to the same barometer.