Price per square metre: what it tells you and how to use it
Price per square metre divides what a home sold for by its floor area, so homes of different sizes can be compared. What the figure shows, what it leaves out, and how to use it to judge an asking price.
Published · figures to September 2026
What it is
Price per square metre is the price paid for a home divided by its floor area. A home that sold for £240,000 with 80 m² of floor sold for £3,000 a square metre. To turn that into price per square foot, divide by 10.7639: £3,000 a square metre is about £279 a square foot.
Across England and Wales, homes sold for a median of £3,360 a square metre over the 24 months to September 2026, about £312 a square foot. Half sold for more and half for less.
Why it helps
A price on its own mixes up two things: where a home is and how big it is. A £300,000 two-bedroom flat and a £300,000 four-bedroom house cost the same, but one gives far more room for the money. Dividing by the floor area puts them on the same footing, so you can compare an asking price with what homes nearby sold for, compare one area with another, or see how much space a budget buys.
What it doesn't tell you
The type of home matters. In Leeds over the same two years, detached houses sold for a median of £3,790 a square metre and terraced houses £2,550. Compare a home with others of its type where you can.
| Type | Sales | £ / m² | Median price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Detached | 3,345 | £3,790 | £425,000 |
| Semi-detached | 7,313 | £3,170 | £260,000 |
| Flat or maisonette | 2,079 | £2,620 | £150,000 |
| Terraced | 5,205 | £2,550 | £200,000 |
Counted sales in Leeds over the 24 months to September 2026. HM Land Registry price paid data and MHCLG energy certificates.
Floor area isn't everything a buyer pays for. A garden, a garage, parking, the view and the state of the kitchen all add to a price without adding a square metre, so a home with a large plot or in poor repair can look out of line when it isn't.
The floor area has to be right. Ours comes from the home's latest energy certificate. A certificate made before an extension shows the old size, and an agent's floor plan may measure differently. How to find a home's floor area covers where the figure comes from.
A median is one point in a spread. In Leeds the median was £3,050 a square metre, but the middle half of sales ran from £2,440 to £3,680. A home a little above or below the median is normal; the further it sits outside that middle half, the more it needs a reason.
How to use it on this site
Look up an area. Every council, postcode district and sector page gives the median price per square metre over the last 24 months, the middle half of sales, the figures for each type of home and the trend since 1995. Start from all areas, the heat map or the search box.
Look up a home. A home's page shows the price per square metre of each time it sold, today's value indexed from its last sale, and an implied range: its floor area multiplied by the middle half of prices per square metre in its sector.
Check an asking price. The price check divides an asking price by the floor area and compares the result with the median for the same type of home in the postcode sector. Within 5% either way is in line with local sales; 5 to 15% away is above or below; more than 15% is well above or well below.
A worked example
Say a terraced house in Leeds with 90 m² of floor is on the market for £230,000. That is £230,000 ÷ 90, about £2,560 a square metre. The median for terraced houses across Leeds was £2,550, so the asking price is in line with what terraced houses there sold for.
The price check would make the same comparison against the home's postcode sector, which can be well above or below the city as a whole, and it lists the recent sales it compared with. The verdict is a starting point for questions about the home itself, not an answer to what it is worth.
Sales to September 2026 · HM Land Registry price paid data · MHCLG energy certificates · An index-based comparison of sold prices, not a valuation.