The average price per m² in Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt is 3 195 €/m² for an apartment, based on actual notarised (DVF) sales. About 70 transactions are recorded each year.
Mood illustration of Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt, in the Val-d'Oise, on the edge of the forêt de Montmorency.
The average price of apartments in Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt stands at 3 195 €/m², according to the DVF transactions actually registered before notaries. That average covers a contrasting stock: blocks of flats from the 1960s and 1970s, built when the population doubled, low-rise houses and town houses of the plaine de France, and a few fine properties inherited from the days when the town was a holiday retreat. The type of property, its condition, the floor, the aspect and the closeness to the station make the value of a home vary appreciably. The municipality covers barely six square kilometres, between the edge of the forêt de Montmorency to the west and the plaine de France to the east.
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 Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt market remains steady, with in the order of seventy sales a year recorded in the DVF data. That turnover follows from the structure of the stock, split between apartments in estates and detached houses, and from a population of permanent residents who move as family circumstances change. New supply stays limited by the size of the municipality, six square kilometres already largely built up between the forêt de Montmorency and the plaine de France.
Several factors support the level of prices. The service by Line H of the Transilien, some twenty minutes from Paris-Nord, places the municipality within the employment area of the capital and attracts working people and first-time buyers. The closeness of the forêt de Montmorency and the residential character of the town, away from the neighbouring post-war housing estates, sustain demand from families. Conversely, the age of part of the 1960s and 1970s apartment stock weighs on the values of homes in need of renovation, which remain more affordable.
Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt sits at an intermediate level for the sector: above Sarcelles, its immediate neighbour, but below Montmorency, close by on the hillside, and well behind Enghien-les-Bains, the most expensive in the area.
Saint-Brice is recorded as early as 1125 under the name Sanctus Bricius, and the parish then took in the neighbouring hamlet of Piscop. The village came under the castellany of the Montmorency family and counted some sixty fiefs in the Middle Ages. In 1632, after the beheading of Duke Henri II de Montmorency, condemned for conspiring against Richelieu, his estate passed to his sister Charlotte-Marguerite, wife of the prince de Condé. The lordship then changed hands several times, the last local lord, Christophe de Braque, dying at the château in 1740.
In the middle of the 18th century, the municipality gathered around eight hundred inhabitants and lived mainly on the vine, its main farming activity, supplemented by the lacemaking practised by the women. After 1800, the closeness of Paris made Saint-Brice a sought-after holiday retreat: twenty-two fine properties were counted there before 1914, among them the Tour de Nézant and the Pavillon Colombe. Talleyrand owned the château between 1812 and 1815. The name sous-Forêt appeared officially on 21 September 1850, in reference to the nearby forêt de Montmorency.
The Sarcelles - Saint-Brice station opened in 1877 on the line of the Compagnie des chemins de fer du Nord. Market gardening on the plaine de France took over from the vine: in 1907, the municipality was still sending one hundred and forty wagonloads of leeks a month to the industrial towns of the north. The turning point was demographic: between 1960 and 1970, the population doubled, rising from around 3 500 to 7 000 inhabitants, with the building of the Vergers, Coteaux, Marronniers and Cottages estates. The American novelist Edith Wharton lived at the Pavillon Colombe from 1919 until her death in 1937.
Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt has 15 063 inhabitants. According to INSEE, the French national statistics institute, the municipality counts in the order of 5 400 dwellings, of which nearly 95 % are main residences and a very small share second homes: this is a residential town lived in year-round, not a holiday municipality. Again according to INSEE, apartments account for around 56 % of the stock and houses 44 %, and close to 60 % of main residences are occupied by their owners. The built stock is mostly recent, more than seven dwellings in ten having been put up after 1970, with a high proportion of large homes. Buyers are above all Paris-region families and first-time buyers, often working people employed in Paris who take Line H every day.
The average price of apartments in Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt is 3 195 €/m², according to the DVF transactions actually completed before notaries. That average covers gaps depending on the type of property, the year of construction, the floor, the condition and the distance to the station. A town house and an apartment in a 1970s estate do not trade at the same level.
The Sarcelles - Saint-Brice station, opened in 1877, is served by Line H of the Transilien towards Paris-Nord, which puts the capital some twenty minutes away by train. The municipality lies around thirteen kilometres north of Paris, alongside the former route nationale 1, today the RD 301. That rail service weighs in the demand from people who work in Paris.
The stock is fairly balanced: according to INSEE, around 56 % of dwellings are apartments and 44 % houses. The blocks of flats are concentrated in the estates of the 1960s and 1970s, built when the population doubled, while the houses occupy the low-rise districts and a few fine period properties. The built stock is rather recent and large homes are numerous.
A former holiday retreat for Parisians in the 19th century, the municipality became part of the conurbation from the 1960s onwards with the building of several estates. Today nearly 95 % of dwellings are main residences and the share of second homes is marginal. The closeness of the forêt de Montmorency and the service by Line H sustain demand from families looking to live there year-round.
Both segments are present in close proportions, with a slight edge to apartments. The reference price of 3 195 €/m² covers the apartment segment, the majority in the DVF data. Houses, more sought after by families, generally trade above that level and come onto the market less often. The choice depends on the budget, the floor area targeted and the closeness wanted to the station.
This analysis is published by Immover, an independent observatory founded by Antony Barbier. Data sourced from official sources (DVF, INSEE, Notaries of France).