The average price per m² in Cabourg is 5 394 €/m² for an apartment, based on actual notarised (DVF) sales. About 254 transactions are recorded each year.
Ambience illustration of Cabourg, a seaside resort on the Côte Fleurie.
In Cabourg, the average price stands at 5 394 €/m². That average covers a very particular housing stock: close to eight dwellings out of ten are apartments, often small units in seafront developments or in the blocks of the centre. The seaside villas inherited from the Belle Époque, rarer and larger, pull part of the transactions upwards, while the studios set back from the promenade stay more affordable. This figure comes from the DVF data, that is, from sales actually registered before notaries, and not from listings.
Prices from the DVF file (Demandes de valeurs foncières, published by the DGFiP), transactions actually recorded at the notary at municipality level. Cross-referenced with the Notaires de France - INSEE indices. Learn more about our methodology.
The market in Cabourg is first of all a second-home market, which makes it sensitive to drivers different from those of a working town. Demand comes largely from the Paris region, around two and a half hours away by road, and focuses on properties close to the promenade. The limited number of building plots, the presence of wetlands behind the coast and the protection of the historic buildings since 2014 mechanically reduce the output of new housing. The result: supply grows little, while the resident population rose by around 2 % between 2017 and 2023 according to INSEE.
The second driver is tourism, which shapes the local economy all year round: casino, seawater spa, racecourse, the Cabourg film festival in June, and immediate closeness to the D-Day beaches and the pays d'Auge. This activity supports seasonal rental values and attracts buyers who let their property part of the year. In return, it exposes the commune to end-of-season decisions: properties often come on the market in the autumn, which lengthens negotiation times on the least well-placed homes. The shrinking size of retired households also keeps a steady flow of resales.
Like most seaside resorts of the Côte Fleurie, Cabourg sits clearly above the large neighbouring Normandy towns. Its price level is closer to that of comparable coastal resorts than to the urban markets of Caen or Le Havre.
The name Cabourg is recorded as early as the 11th century in the forms Cathburgum, around 1066-1079, then Cadburg in 1082. Until the middle of the 19th century it was no more than a modest village of some two hundred inhabitants, cut off from the shore by marshes: the 1793 census counted only 165 souls. Everything changed from 1853, when the Paris businessman and lawyer Henri Durand-Morimbau spotted the site and set about creating a seaside resort from scratch. A company was formed, hundreds of trees were planted along the future avenues, and the first stone of the casino, then built in wood, was laid on 9 May 1854.
The chosen plan is radial: avenues converge on a central square, in the manner of ancient theatres. This is the Éventail, which still gives Cabourg its recognisable shape and always brings the stroller back towards the casino and the gardens. The resort, opened under the name Cabourg-les-Bains in 1855, really took off with the railway: the line reached Mézidon in 1879, then was extended towards Trouville-Deauville between 1882 and 1884. A promenade of 1 200 metres was laid out in 1887. The casino was rebuilt in stone as early as 1867, then casino and Grand Hôtel were rebuilt in 1907 and 1908.
Marcel Proust stayed at the Grand Hôtel every summer from 1907 to 1914, in room 414, and made Cabourg the model for Balbec in In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower. The two wars interrupted the holiday trade, but the resort started again after 1945: the population reached 3 479 inhabitants in 1946, and the council led by Bruno Coquatrix, also director of the Olympia, modernised the facilities in the 1970s. The Grand Hôtel, the casino and the casino gardens have been listed as historic monuments since 2014. The commune has 3 725 inhabitants, in an urban grid that has stayed faithful to the layout of 1853.
Cabourg has 3 725 inhabitants, but the commune lives above all to the rhythm of its weekend owners. According to INSEE, the French national statistics institute, out of the roughly 11 100 dwellings recorded, 78,9 % are second homes and only 20,1 % main residences, with a very low vacancy rate, around 1 %. The stock is overwhelmingly made up of flats: 78,3 % apartments against 21,5 % houses. Among main residences, 56,6 % of households are owner-occupiers. Buyers are therefore mostly people from the Paris region and from Normandy looking for a coastal pied-à-terre, joined by retired households turning a holiday home into a main residence.
The average price recorded in Cabourg is 5 394 €/m². It is an average calculated on sales actually registered before notaries and published in the DVF database, not on agency asking prices. The same property can depart from it appreciably depending on the floor level, the sea view, the general condition and the distance to the promenade. Our online valuation refines that average from the features of your home.
The seafront and the promenade Marcel-Proust concentrate the strongest demand, with apartments looking straight out over the bay. Then comes the Éventail, the historic centre laid out in 1853 around the casino and its gardens, valued for its villas and its immediate closeness to the shops. The sectors set back, towards the Caen road and the banks of the Dives, offer larger floor areas at lower price levels.
The nearest station is Dives-Cabourg, in the neighbouring commune of Dives-sur-Mer, a few minutes from the centre. It is linked to Paris Saint-Lazare with a change at Trouville-Deauville, the section between the two stations being run by Nomad trains, with extra services in summer. Nomad coach routes complete the service towards Caen, Deauville and Honfleur. By car, Caen is around 21 kilometres away.
The residence tax has been abolished on main homes, but it is still due on second homes, which make up close to 79 % of the housing stock in Cabourg according to INSEE. To this is added the local property tax, whose municipal rate is voted each year. Some tourist communes are allowed to increase the residence tax on second homes: check the situation in force with the town hall or the public finance office before buying.
The market is very unbalanced: apartments make up 78,3 % of the commune's dwellings according to INSEE, against 21,5 % houses. The supply of apartments is therefore wide, from the seafront studio to the large floor in a recent development, with steady turnover. Houses, in particular the older seaside villas of the Éventail, are rarer, often sell outside the busiest periods and call for more patience on the buyer's side.
This analysis is published by Immover, an independent observatory founded by Antony Barbier. Data sourced from official sources (DVF, INSEE, Notaries of France).