July 2026: The Great Price Divide, Dunmow Property Market
If you took every house currently for sale in Dunmow and put them in a line, the price tags on the windows would be, on average, £104,000 higher than the price people are actually paying when they shake hands on a deal, and while that may sound like a bit of a muddle, it’s actually a fascinating glimpse into how our local market is behaving right now.
My bold prediction for the rest of the summer? We are going to see a "Great Reset." Sellers who want to move before the leaves turn brown in the autumn will need to stop looking at what their neighbours asked for and start looking at what the neighbours actually got.
The Price on the Sticker Currently, if you’re browsing for a new home in CM6, the average asking price is £562,852. To give you an idea of what that gets you, it’s roughly the cost of a lovely three-bedroom semi-detached home. Since last month, this figure has dipped slightly by £753. It’s a tiny nudge downwards, nothing to worry about, but a sign that people are becoming a bit more realistic.
Plenty of Choice on the High Street Whether you’re eyeing up a property in Great Easton or the Stortford Road, you’ve got plenty of options. There are currently 456 homes for sale across the CM6 postcode area. Because houses are, on average, taking a little longer to find their "forever owners," we’ve seen the number of available homes grow. In fact, there are about 20 months' worth of houses waiting for buyers if no new ones were added to the list! This means if you’re looking to buy, you are the guest of honour at the party—you have the time to look around and find exactly what you want.
What’s Actually Happening at the Solicitors? When we look at the last 12 months, the average price people actually paid (the "sold price") was £458,852. We’ve seen 361 sales over the last year, which works out to about 23 families moving house every single month across the postcode. From the grand £4 million sale at Foxton’s Yard to the cosy terraces in our smaller villages, the market is definitely moving, even if it’s at a gentler pace than in previous years.
Interestingly, while asking prices dipped a tiny bit this month, the prices people are actually paying went up by £3,140 since June. This tells me that the properties priced fairly from day one are still being snapped up for decent money.
The Seven-Year Sweet Spot If you bought your home in CM6 back in July 2019, you’re sitting on a very tidy "thank you" from the property market. On average, a home bought seven years ago is now worth £13,753 more today. Think of it as a giant piggy bank in the shape of your house. Even with all the ups and downs of the world since 2019, your home has quietly grown in value by 3.1%. That’s real money in your pocket that wasn’t there before.
What does this mean for you? If you live in Dunmow, we are firmly in a "Buyer's Market." This means buyers have the upper hand. If you’re selling, your home needs to look its absolute best and be priced to tempt people away from the other 455 options they have! If you're buying, it's a great time to find a gem in Barnston or a barn conversion in Felsted without the "mad rush" we saw a few years ago.