House and apartment prices by municipality, 2026 trends and purchase costs: the benchmarks for buying in Brussels.
The Brussels property market remains the most expensive in Belgium for houses, but most sales are of apartments. According to the Federation of Notaries (Fednot), the median price of a Brussels house reached €510,000 in 2025, compared with €265,000 for an apartment. Apartments account for 70.3% of the Brussels market, a share with no equivalent in Flanders or Wallonia.
The gaps between municipalities are clear. Woluwe-Saint-Pierre comes out on top for both houses and apartments, while Molenbeek-Saint-Jean remains the cheapest municipality for a house. In 2026, activity picked up: home sales rose 6.1% in the first quarter and then 1.6% in the second, and the average price of a house climbed to €611,873 in the first half.
This guide reviews the most sought-after and the most affordable municipalities, recent price changes and the costs to expect when buying in Brussels, in particular registration duties and the allowance reserved for a main residence.
According to the notaries' 2025 review, Woluwe-Saint-Pierre has the highest median price in the Region for a house, €746,500, up 9.8% compared with 2021. It is also where apartments are most expensive, with a median price of €360,001, up 4.3% over one year. The municipality mainly attracts couples and families: solo apartment purchases are the least frequent there in Brussels.
Ixelles remains among the most expensive municipalities, but its prices have stalled. The median price of a house there is €700,000, down 5.1% over five years: it is the only Brussels municipality where house values fell over the period. For apartments, Ixelles lost first place to Woluwe-Saint-Pierre, with a slight dip in 2025 (down 1.4%) but a rise of 11.3% over five years. Ixelles also attracts buyers from elsewhere: 20.1% of house buyers did not live in Brussels.
Forest is the municipality where house prices rose the most over five years: up 25.8%, for a median price of €553,500 in 2025. Couples bought 86.2% of the houses sold there. By contrast, the median price of apartments in Forest fell 3.3% in one year, from €289,500 to €280,000, the sharpest drop in the Region.
Auderghem and Etterbeek saw the median price of houses stagnate over five years. Once inflation is taken into account, the notaries estimate that these houses lost value. Auderghem appeals mainly to people from Brussels: 95.1% of the houses sold in 2025 went to buyers already living in the Region.
For a tighter budget, the municipalities in the west and north remain the entry points to the market. Molenbeek-Saint-Jean is the cheapest municipality for a house. Saint-Josse-ten-Noode and Molenbeek attract young buyers: 35% and 34% of the apartments there were bought by 18-30 year olds. Saint-Josse did, however, see the median price of its apartments climb from €199,500 to €230,000 between 2024 and 2025, up 15.3%.
Schaerbeek stands out among first-time house buyers: 18% of the 18-30 year olds who bought a house in Brussels did so in this municipality. Saint-Gilles, finally, stands out for its share of solo purchases: 71.1% of the apartments there were bought by a single person.
Over five years, the median price of apartments rose in all 19 municipalities, from 1.66% in Uccle to 18.4% in Koekelberg. A municipality is not uniform, however: prices vary sharply from one neighbourhood to the next, and it is often the exact address that sets the price.
In 2025, sales growth was weaker in Brussels (up 7.1%) than in Wallonia and Flanders. The notaries partly explain this by the reduced rates granted to first-time buyers in the other two regions, which may have drawn some prospective buyers away from the capital. The median price of Brussels houses rose 2% over the year, and 10.9% over five years.
2026 has started better. In the first quarter, sales rose 6.1% over one year, and the average price of an apartment reached €302,737. In the first half, the average price of a house stood at €611,873 (up 5.2% on the 2025 average) and that of an apartment at €299,501 (up 1.0%). House sales jumped 9.1% in the second quarter, while apartment sales fell 1.3%.
Be careful not to confuse the indicators: the median price (half of sales above, half below) and the average price, pulled up by the most expensive properties, give different figures.
The notaries observe a halt for older properties because of energy requirements. Banks now require the buyer to budget for energy renovation or to turn to a home that already performs well, and is therefore more expensive. Before making any offer, read the EPC certificate (PEB) that the seller must give you and cost the work.
In the Brussels-Capital Region, registration duties on a sale are 12.5% of the price. The Region provides an allowance: for a main residence, the buyer pays no duties on the first €200,000, a saving of €25,000. The main conditions:
An additional allowance of €25,000 per energy class jump, from two jumps, exists in the case of renovation. Check with the notary the amounts in force at the date of your preliminary contract.
The Region recommends budgeting, on top of the price, up to 18% for purchase-related costs (registration duties, notary fees, credit costs), and being able to pay a deposit of about 10% when signing the preliminary contract.
If you are searching from abroad, a Remoters home finder based in Brussels can target the municipalities that fit your budget, view properties for you, check the property's documents and support you through to the preliminary contract. The first conversation and the quote are free.
Short answers to the questions our readers ask, written to stand on their own.
Sources cited in this article
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