The average price per m² in Machecoul-Saint-Même is 2 252 €/m² for an apartment, based on actual notarised (DVF) sales. About 11 transactions are recorded each year.
Atmospheric illustration of Machecoul-Saint-Même, a market town of the Pays de Retz on the edge of the Marais breton.
In Machecoul-Saint-Même, the benchmark price stands at 2 252 €/m² for an apartment. The new municipality covers 84,89 square kilometres between hedged farmland and marshland, with a housing stock made up of more than 84 per cent houses: apartment buildings are rare and concentrated in the town of Machecoul. These values come from DVF data, the French notarised sales database, which records transactions actually registered with notaries rather than estimates from listings. The level remains far below that of the Pays de Retz coast, some twenty kilometres away, which defines the positioning of the local market.
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 Machecoul-Saint-Même market benefits from an underlying trend: demand from Nantes spreading towards the south-west of the department, as prices in the inner suburbs and on the coast move beyond household budgets. The municipality's role as a main town, with its shops, schools and health services, makes it a credible destination for permanent settlement, which the marshland villages are not. The population of 7 689 inhabitants and the range of services support this position.
The point to watch is the older housing stock. With 8,2 per cent vacant dwellings according to INSEE, the municipality has a stock of properties that are hard to bring back onto the market without works, often in the old fabric of the town. The energy renovation of this stock will determine how average values evolve: renovated properties sell normally, the others suffer growing discounts. The wetland constraint also limits new-build supply, which works in the opposite direction.
The municipality sits at the lower end of its area: its prices remain below those of Saint-Herblain and Challans, and well below those of Pornic, on the coast.
Machecoul-Saint-Même is a new municipality created on 1 January 2016 through the merger of Machecoul and Saint-Même-le-Tenu, in the Loire-Atlantique department. It covers 84,89 square kilometres in the Pays de Retz, a territory traditionally attached to historic Brittany, between hedged farmland and marshland. The Falleron and the Tenu drain this landscape of low-lying land, drained and embanked over the centuries for livestock and crops. This marshland geography, long hard to reach, explains the town's long-standing autonomy and its role as a market place.
The castle of Machecoul, of which imposing ruins remain, was the residence of Gilles de Rais, Marshal of France born in 1405 and executed in 1440, the best-known figure of local history. The Gondi family, which produced several cardinals, also left its mark on the territory, as shown by the abbey of Notre-Dame de la Chaume and various religious buildings. In March 1793, Machecoul was one of the first centres of the Vendée uprising, an episode that left a lasting mark on the memory of the Pays de Retz.
The modern era gave the town an unexpected industrial identity: Machecoul became a French centre of the cycle industry, with bicycle production that employed several hundred people and made the town's name known well beyond the region. The municipality had 7 689 inhabitants in 2023 and acts as the main town of the Sud Retz Atlantique inter-municipal authority, with shops, schools and health services, in an area where the next centres are some twenty kilometres away.
According to INSEE, the French statistics institute, the municipality has 7 689 inhabitants, with 89,1 per cent main residences, 2,7 per cent second homes and 8,2 per cent vacant dwellings. The stock is very largely individual housing, with 84,2 per cent houses against 15,2 per cent apartments, and 70,6 per cent of main residences are owner-occupied. Buyers are families from the Pays de Retz, workers from the Nantes conurbation willing to move further out to get a plot of land, and households giving up on the coast of Pornic and the Vendée, which has become too expensive.
The benchmark price stands at 2 252 €/m² for an apartment. This figure comes from DVF data, the sales actually signed with notaries. It covers a narrow segment, apartments accounting for only 15,2 per cent of the housing stock according to INSEE. For a house with land, the dominant product of the local market, the valuation depends first on the size of the plot and the condition of the building.
The new municipality, created on 1 January 2016, brings Machecoul and Saint-Même-le-Tenu together under a single administration. Listings may still mention either of the former municipalities. The difference is real on the ground: Machecoul concentrates shops, schools and services, while the Saint-Même-le-Tenu area consists of more scattered rural housing, with a strong dependence on the car.
Nantes and its southern outskirts, around Rezé and Bouguenais, are between twenty-three and twenty-seven kilometres away. Pornic and the Pays de Retz coast are some twenty kilometres away, Challans and the north of the Vendée nineteen. The municipality therefore occupies a central position between three centres without really belonging to any of them, which explains a price level clearly lower than that of each of them.
The municipality lies inland, in the marshland and hedged farmland, with no sea frontage, whereas Pornic or La Bernerie-en-Retz benefit from the coastal premium and a second-home market. It is also further from Nantes than the inner suburbs. Its market is that of a rural main town, with a vacancy rate of 8,2 per cent that reflects an older housing stock in need of renovation.
The municipality lies partly in the Marais breton, an area of drained low-lying land, where the risk of flooding and rising groundwater is regulated by planning documents. Wetlands are subject to specific protections that limit building. The older housing in the town, often stone-built and poorly insulated, requires a precise assessment of the works needed. The local urban development plan can be consulted at the town hall.
This analysis is published by Immover, an independent observatory founded by Antony Barbier. Data sourced from official sources (DVF, INSEE, Notaries of France).