Higher than similar council areas: Average monthly private rent
Average monthly private rent is £1,398 in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (Aug 2026), compared with £979 across five council areas with a similar profile (Wiltshire, Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Shropshire, Somerset); 43% higher. It lies outside the range of all five (£823 to £1,082).
How do we know this?
- Source
- Office for National Statistics: Price Index of Private Rents, UK: monthly price statistics (Open Government Licence v3.0)
- Period
- Aug 2026
- Geography
- Council area, compared with five similar council areas: Wiltshire, Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Shropshire, Somerset
- Method
- Private rents (PIPR). The ONS Price Index of Private Rents measures the change in rents paid by private tenants, and publishes an average (mean) monthly rent per local authority from the same data. The figure is a mean, not a median, so a few very high rents pull it up, especially in London and where there are few lettings. It covers rents paid for homes let on the private market (not social rents) and reflects all tenancies in the stock, not only new lets, except in Scotland where the underlying data are mainly advertised new lets, which makes Scotland not directly comparable with England and Wales. Annual change is the change in the rental price index, not in the cash average. Rents are in cash terms, not adjusted for inflation. Averages by number of bedrooms are held for the latest month only.
- Limitations
- Mean, not median.
- Similar areas are the five council areas closest on population size, share aged 65 and over, share aged under 16, share of neighbourhoods in the most deprived 20%, median house price (standardised); this is a convenience comparison, not a like-for-like guarantee.