Best places to live in Worcestershire: house prices and data by area

Bromsgrove is the dearest at £337,375 and Wyre Forest the cheapest at £253,000: the same budget buys 1.3 times as much home by price at one end of Worcestershire as at the other.

The marker on each bar is the middle asking price of the new homes for sale there today. In 6 of the 6 council areas with enough new homes to compare, new homes are asking more than the homes sold around them: a new home is often larger or a different kind, so the gap is not the new-build premium on its own.

398 new homes are for sale across Worcestershire today. Malvern Hills has the most (121), then Wyre Forest (82).

Price per square foot takes the size of the home out of the comparison. It runs from £272 in Wyre Forest to £339 in Bromsgrove.

Sales for every thousand households show how often homes change hands, which is how much choice a buyer has in a year. Worcester is the busiest (27) and Wychavon the quietest (25), around a middle of 27.

A busy market is a sign of both supply and demand: more homes are coming up, and more buyers are competing for them.

In Wyre Forest, 4% of the homes sold in the last twelve months were sold new, the highest share in Worcestershire; in Worcester it was 0%. New sales reach the register later than resales, so the latest months undercount them.

Sold prices were flat in the middle council area of Worcestershire over the last year. Redditch moved most (up 1.7%) and Wyre Forest least (down 2.3%).

The mix of homes sold changes from year to year, so a single council area can swing for that reason alone; read the pattern across the areas more than any one bar.

Over three years the middle council area's sold prices rose 1.5%, led by Redditch (up 5.4%).

Over three years the cheaper council areas of Worcestershire have clearly grown faster than the dearer ones, closing some of the gap between them.

There is no clear pattern between distance to Birmingham and growth over three years: places close in and far out have moved alike.

Distance to Birmingham does not explain prices in Worcestershire: council areas near and far sell for much the same per square foot, so something else (the coast, a second city, the countryside) is setting them.

Unusually, council areas further from Birmingham have loosely fewer workers driving to work.

In Worcestershire, house prices do not follow school outcomes from one council area to the next: there are well-judged schools in cheaper areas as well as dearer ones.

A council area is large: the school a home is offered depends on its own address, so check the schools around a development before relying on this.

Attainment 8 is a pupil's score across eight GCSE subjects. The secondary schools of Worcester average the highest in Worcestershire (48.1) and those of Wyre Forest the lowest (40.4).

Results are clearly higher further from Birmingham, so here there is a trade between results and a short journey in.

Density says what kind of place an area is: how close the homes, shops, schools and stations sit. Worcester is the most built up (3,121 people per square kilometre) and Malvern Hills the least (138).

Younger council areas in Worcestershire are loosely better off, which is common where a city draws working-age people. Areas above the line earn more than their age alone would suggest.

Areas towards the top right have the most children and the largest households: Redditch, Bromsgrove and Worcester lead for residents under fifteen. Towards the bottom left are the areas with more single people and couples.

In the middle council area of Worcestershire, 14% of households rent privately. Cheaper areas clearly have more renters.

Worcester, Redditch and Wyre Forest have the highest walk scores in Worcestershire. Denser areas are clearly more walkable, because more is close by; an area above the line is easier on foot than its density alone would suggest.

Another way to see how easy it is to get about is how many households manage without a car. In Worcester, 20% have none, the most in Worcestershire. Areas towards the bottom right are where daily life depends least on driving.

A band D home pays £2,512 a year in Wyre Forest, the most in Worcestershire, and £2,373 in Wychavon, the least: a difference of £139 every year for the same band.

A new home is banded when it is finished, so ask the builder which band each plot is expected to fall in.

Police recorded 116 crimes for every thousand residents in Worcester over the last year held, and 59 in Malvern Hills. City centres record more because of the people who visit them, not only those who live there, and a council area's figure hides wide differences between its streets.