The Average Asking Price in Swindon is 24% higher than the Average Sold Price. What is going on!?

I’m talking about conversations you’ll hear British people talking about at the bus stop, or in the queue at the shop, or down at The GW over half a pint of Arkells Best.

And in general, we (generally speaking) feel it is good news when prices shift up rather than down.

So it should therefore feel like good news if I tell you that, according to the good folk at property analytics site home.co.uk, the average asking price of properties in Swindon sits at £317,760 and reflects a 3% annual increase over the past 12 months.

So, all hunky dory…

It would seem based on the above that all is fine and well. But, we are talking about asking prices at the moment, and ‘sold prices’ probably matter to us all a little bit more.

When it comes to ‘sold’ prices, we would look to the most recent land registry data as recorded by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Now, here we can see that prices did climb – but by a lesser amount; 1.4% in 12 months.

The below graph shows how true average sold prices in Swindon have fluctuated over the past two decades, but you can spot the encouraging up-tick since the last time that prices bottomed out, in 2023:

Still positive then overall… but nevertheless, in the process checking out that data – official data provided by the government from real sales recording on Land Registry – we see something a little alarming.

Whilst the average asking price for properties currently for sale in Swindon is £317,760, the average sold price of properties over twelve months in Swindon was £256,000.

That is a difference of over £60,000!

To put it another way, the average sold price for a property in Swindon is 19% lower than the average listing price… or, to run the maths the other way around, the average listing price is 24% higher than the average sold price.

So what exactly is happening here? Are Estate Agents in Swindon really overvaluing properties by almost a quarter? By over £60,000 on average?!

And if they are, what is driving them to do so?

In today’s blog I explore the numbers and aim to bust a couple of myths, because – as is so often the case in this mad world of property – things are not actually as they seem…

The current shape of the Swindon property market

Before we dive into the analytics, let’s take a moment to understand the way the market currently looks when it comes to property in Swindon.

There are 1,171 properties listed ‘For Sale’ on Rightmove in a Swindon property search. On top of that, a further 1,369 properties are listed as ‘Sold STC’ in our little slice of Wiltshire – which means, out of a total of 2,540 properties on the sales market currently, over half of all sellers (54%) are currently inching their way towards the result they want.

So, 1,171 Swindon properties still for sale; is that good or bad?

Well, when we consider that of those 1,171 properties, 279 came to market within the last two weeks alone, i.e.  almost 1 in 4 of the total properties for sale, these numbers start to look pretty positive.

In fact, to sprinkle just a little more positivity – but also to add to the confusion – only 212 of those 1,171 homes for sale in Swindon have been on the market at their current price prior to January 1st.

That means only around 18% of the total market has been what we might reasonably class as ‘languishing’ on the market – and in UK property market terms, that is not bad at all.   

The Swindon property market is therefore not looking to be in bad shape at all as we head into the busy post-Easter period.

So the question remains, when it comes to those 1,369 ‘sold’ subject to contract properties, have they really had to drop 19% off their list price, in order to achieve a sale?

Why the difference between For Sale and Sold prices in Swindon?

Most people on the street would tell you that properties go on the market for more than they eventually sell for.

But 24% more? Really?

As it happens, Property Reporter – a property industry magazine – has addressed this in the past, and actually reports that sellers accept offers of around 3-4% off their list prices on average.

Looking at our own figures, I would say our own sales are at least there, if not a little better – more like 2% off asking.

Now, I know we’re good at what we do here at The House Group – but not even I would claim that we are ten times better than the local competition (well, perhaps on second thoughts…).

But, if sellers aren’t really dropping one-fifth off their listing prices in order to sell a property in Swindon, what is causing the stark difference between the Asking Prices we see on sites such as Rightmove and Zoopla, and the Sold Prices that get recorded by Land Registry and end up the ONS?

As I said earlier, things are not necessarily how they first appear.

Here are a few things to consider.

1. Premium Properties in Swindon Stay ‘On Market’ for Longer

Higher-end, aspirational properties often remain on the market for extended periods, keeping the average asking price of property inflated. Sellers might be testing the market with ambitious initial prices, causing these listings to skew the overall asking price data upward.

For example, the ten highest priced properties in Swindon listed on Rightmove right now sit between £900,000 and £6,000,000.

Three of those top ten have been on the market at the same price since prior to 2025.

So, only 18% of all properties here have been on the market for in excess of three months, but 30% of the most expensive have been…

And of course that leads to a skewing of the data.

This is not a criticism, it is just an observation. But it is the sort of observation that leads to a question: how many accurately priced ‘average’ Swindon sales, at around that £256,000 mark, will have come to market, found a buyer, gone through conveyancing and already come off Rightmove, during the same time frame that those more expensive, ‘aged-listings’ have been ‘trying’, given that some of them date all the way back to 2023 on the market?

Like I say, not a criticism (cough cough), but it does illustrate just how easy it is to skew the average asking price figure upwards of the average sale price reality, when higher priced listings clog the marketplace.

2. Overpriced Listings Don’t Sell

Entirely unrelated to my last point (I promise), but some properties are listed significantly above their realistic market value, and frankly these homes don't sell – or, if they do, it is not without substantial price reductions.

In any case, those initial over-inflated asking prices contribute heavily to the overall average asking price that gets recorded.

3. Property Sales and the ‘Data Lag’ Effect

Average asking prices – whether they are inflated or otherwise – do reflect real-time market sentiment.

Sold price data on the other hand, as recorded by the Land Registry, reported by the ONS, and being the data that feeds through to the reports that you find on Zoopla and Rightmove, trails behind actual market activity by several months.

In fact, the numbers I provided in the opening action of this article included ONS data for the ‘sold price’ number – and that data, being the most up to date available, is current up to February of this year. Conversely the asking price data reported by home.co.uk takes us right up to the last fortnight.

This lag can create a mismatch, particularly if market conditions change quickly – and one might argue, for example, that the first three months of 2025, and March in particular (still not showing on Land Registry and ONS data), fired on by the rush to beat a stamp duty change on April 1^st which we have written about in other blogs previously. may be the sort of event that throws norms out of sync for a period.

4. Different Types of Properties currently on the Market

The types of properties currently listed versus those recently sold can differ significantly. An influx of higher-value homes newly listed can inflate asking price averages, for example, even if sales over the twelve months may have predominantly occurred amongst lower-value properties.

Again, those lower priced, general-market properties, by merit of being more accessible to ‘average buyers’, tend to naturally shape those ‘average sold prices’ with their naturally quicker, more frequent churn.

5. Price Reductions Prior to Achieving a Sale

It is not an uncommon practice for sellers to start with a more ambitious asking price. That opinion I mentioned earlier, of the ‘average person on the street’? Well, they have a point…

Of course, ‘ambitious’ is perhaps a euphemism for ‘too high’, and therefore – if motivated – they may gradually reduce the price until achieving a sale.

Whilst the final agreed sale might be very close to the final asking price, that price reduction journey from the original listing price can be substantial.

Nevertheless, it is the initial asking price that forms the ‘asking price average’ on data aggregator sites, and therefore that is the data that commentators and news outlets then report – which can create the wrong impression for potential movers.

6. Motivated Sellers vs Opportunistic Listings

Motivated sellers typically price their properties more realistically from the outset, securing quick sales more quickly and at close to or even at or above their asking price.

Conversely, opportunistic sellers – those who feel inclined or who are potentially encouraged by an agent to ‘take a punt’, will tend to inflate their asking prices.

In such speculative cases it is about selling ‘if it is worth it’. That might mean selling only if a top price can be achieved – or perhaps even a ‘better-than-market-value’ price.

The problem is, of course, that this practice can contribute significantly to the higher average listing prices we see, as such opportunist listings rarely achieve the sale price they hope to.

The counter argument there of course is that ‘rarely’ also means ‘they occasionally do’, and therefore this type of practice is always going to be something that for some homeowners is worthwhile, and which we have to accept will impact the property market when it comes to average asking prices recorded.

A Final Thought

To sum up, the apparent 24% gap between the average Swindon property price when sold versus the price for sale is not actually indicative of the price that any given property sells for, compared to the price it is listed for at the time.

As I mentioned, our own figure is vastly, vastly closer (and other agents would report similarly, I’m sure).

Instead, this discrepancy is the result of various market dynamics and behaviours, coupled with the vagaries that a system such as ours will throw up when it records asking prices in one way and at one point in time, whilst recording sold prices another way, and with a time lag thrown in to boot.

Understanding these nuances should provide clarity and reassurance to both buyers and sellers navigating our local Swindon property market.