Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
The town, home to 5,714 people, lies in Loire-Atlantique, Pays de la Loire.
Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef grades low on several counts. Taken together, its subjects give Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef a D overall, better than just over a tenth of compared French towns. The ranking puts it #91 of 93 in Loire-Atlantique. Prices are high against local incomes: at the median price, a 70 m² home costs 10.5 times the median annual income per consumption unit in the intercommunality. Its strongest subject is jobs & income: 0.5 jobs per working resident; 8.5% unemployment.
Figures: employment, INSEE census 2023 · prices, DVF · income per consumption unit (an income adjusted for household size), INSEE Filosofi.
Hazard risk isn’t graded in France yet: national flood maps cover only some areas. The overall grade uses the other six subjects.
The 3 things Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef does most differently from other towns.
Each subject compares Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef with other French towns of 2,500 or more, ordered by how far its rank is from the middle. American and UK towns are graded separately.
How TownRatings grades French towns →
The Culture ministry lists no building in Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef as a monument historique. That’s true of 25% of compared French towns too.
The nearest classé monument is Menhir dit La Pierre de Couche, in Saint-Brevin-les-Pins, 2 mi away.
4.2% of its homes were built before 1919, against 7.4% in the median compared French town.
Explore the history →Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef.
Rents are the ministry’s estimates of advertised rents, not rents actually paid.
The estimated advertised rent is €13.60/m² a month, above both Loire-Atlantique’s towns (€12.75/m²) and compared French towns (€12.41/m²). Renting a house costs an estimated €11.53/m² a month. Among the homes sold, 81% were houses.
| By type | Median per m² | Sales |
|---|---|---|
| Houses | €4,107/m² | 325 |
| Apartments | €4,139/m² | 74 |
Source: DGFiP, DVF property sales (Etalab geolocated); Housing Ministry, Carte des loyers 2025; INSEE, Filosofi 2023 · Licence Ouverte
Young adults of 15 to 24 are 7.4% of residents, lower than both Loire-Atlantique’s towns (11%) and compared French towns (11%). Children are 13% of the town. Graduates make up 27% of adults.
52% women, 48% men
About 92 men for every 100 women. Median share of women: Loire-Atlantique 51.0%, France 51.8%. Women live longer than men, so towns with many older residents have more women.
| Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef | Loire-Atlantique median | France median | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 13% | 19% | 17% |
| 15–24 | 7.4% | 11% | 11% |
| 25–44 | 17% | 24% | 23% |
| 45–64 | 29% | 26% | 26% |
| 65+ | 34% | 19% | 22% |
| No diploma | 15% | 14% | 19% |
| CAP or BEP | 33% | 28% | 26% |
| Baccalauréat | 19% | 19% | 18% |
| Higher education | 27% | 34% | 30% |
INSEE, census 2023 · Loire-Atlantique median and France median: the median of compared communes
Violence against people averaged 5.1 per 1,000 residents a year over 2023–2025; graded property crimes averaged 21. Police and gendarmerie figures for Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef show 123 offenses in 2025. Of the graded crimes locally, criminal damage came up most often (2025).
Not in the gradeTheft without violence, drug use and fraud are shown for information but left out of the Safety Grade, which counts violence plus burglaries, vehicle thefts, thefts from vehicles and criminal damage per resident.
Source: SSMSI (Interior Ministry), recorded crime by commune, 2023–2025 · Licence Ouverte · For other physical violence and armed robbery, the count isn’t published when it’s small (five or fewer in a year of the last three), so the index uses the département’s average, 2.5% of the index here. The count covers the offense categories the Safety Grade uses.
Half of residents lived on more than €27,960 a year per consumption unit, close to Loire-Atlantique’s towns (€27,630) and above compared French towns (€25,970). 5.2% of Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef’s working residents had no journey to work at the census. Unemployment is 8.5%.
Source: INSEE, census 2023 (commuting, employment, jobs at place of work); INSEE, Filosofi 2023 · Licence Ouverte
Care access and life expectancy are shown for context, not graded.
The nearest emergency department to Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef is Centre hospitalier de Saint Nazaire, 8.1 mi away. France’s death rates at each age would predict 578 deaths in the town from 2016 to 2025; there were 532, 8% fewer. Women in Loire-Atlantique live to 86.2 on average and men to 80.3 (2025), against 85.9 and 80.3 across France. There are 5 general practitioners in the town.
Source: INSEE, deaths by commune of residence 2016–2025 and censuses; Eurostat, death rates by age (© European Union); INSEE, BPE 2025; DREES, APL 2024; INSEE, life expectancy by département 2025 · Licence Ouverte · The adjustment for care homes is TownRatings’ own modeling, not an official figure.
Nothing in Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef is on the monuments historiques list. These are the nearest classé monuments, within 15.5 mi.
Wikidata has nobody with a French article born in Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef yet.
The nearest towns of 2,500 or more. The map uses IGN’s commune boundaries. See them on the map →
| Town | People | Miles | Overall | Cost | Safety | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef | 5,714 | — | D | D | C | C+ |
| La Plaine-sur-Mer | 4,760 | 2.7 | D− | C− | C+ | C− |
| Saint-Brevin-les-Pins | 14,541 | 4.6 | C | D | C | C |
| Pornic | 18,745 | 4.7 | C | D | C+ | B− |
| Saint-Père-en-Retz | 4,894 | 5.4 | B− | C | C+ | B− |
| Corsept | 2,594 | 6.9 | — | C− | — | C− |
| Chauvé | 3,070 | 7.1 | — | C+ | — | C+ |
People: INSEE, census 2023. Miles: center to center.
It grades C for safety, #75 of 93 in Loire-Atlantique. In 2025 police and gendarmerie recorded 19 burglaries and 52 acts of criminal damage.
By type: houses €4,107/m² (325 sales), apartments €4,139/m² (74 sales). Incomes are higher than in most compared French towns, so Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef grades D for cost of living.
Commune in Loire-Atlantique, Pays de la Loire
Saint-Michel-Chef-Chef is a commune of 5,714 people in the Communauté d'agglomération Pornic Agglo Pays de Retz. TownRatings compares communes, France’s local unit: each has its own mayor and its own statistics. Its area takes in the town and the countryside around it.
Built from INSEE’s 2026 official geography (COG) and IGN Admin Express boundaries
Sources: INSEE, census 2023 (population, employment, commuting) · INSEE, Filosofi 2023 (income per consumption unit, poverty) · DGFiP, DVF property sales, July 2023 to June 2026 · Housing Ministry, Carte des loyers 2025 · SSMSI, recorded crime by commune, 2023–2025 · Ministry of Education (DEPP), brevet and bac results and value-added indicators, 2025 · INSEE, deaths by commune of residence 2016–2025 and censuses 2012–2023; Eurostat, death rates by age (© European Union); INSEE, BPE 2025 (care homes, emergency and maternity units, GPs, pharmacies); DREES, APL 2024; INSEE, life expectancy by département 2025 (provisional) · INSEE, BPE 2025 and Filosofi 200 m grid (walking distances) · IGN Admin Express (boundaries) · TownRatings grades: our own summary of the data, ranking French towns against each other only, updated November 9, 2026. Under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab).
Contains public sector information under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab): INSEE, DGFiP, the Interior Ministry’s statistics service (SSMSI), the Ministry of Education (DEPP), the Health Ministry’s statistics service (DREES) and the Housing Ministry (Carte des loyers). Commune boundaries: IGN Admin Express.