Aptos, California.
Typical home $1,319,589 (+2.9% in a year), asking rent $4,226 (+8.7%). Santa Cruz-Watsonville, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$3,613 (+109%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $37,225 +3%
- $1,282,364$1,319,589 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $95,470 +8%
- $1,224,119$1,319,589 since Sep 2021
Monthly payment to buy the typical home
Home value × that month's 30-year mortgage rate, 20% down, principal and interest. This is the line households feel: prices and rates compound each other.
- Aptos$6,926
- California$3,997
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 46 years.
Typical home values in Aptos, CA rose 2.9% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Aptos, CA rose 8.7% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Aptos runs $4,812/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $5,806 in Oct 2023.
That is $9,039 a month against $4,226 rent: a $6,926 mortgage payment, plus $700 property tax and $1,413 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Aptos
The owning line is the typical home's monthly payment at that month's rate, plus property tax and insurance & upkeep; the renting line is the typical asking rent; the grey line is the mortgage payment on its own. Same homes, same months, both ways of paying for a roof.
- Owning all in$9,039
- Renting$4,226
- Mortgage only$6,926
Property tax · $700/mo 0.64% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Santa Cruz County, CA
Insurance & upkeep · $1,413/mo insurance, maintenance and repairs together, from the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey — the national figure for mortgaged homeowners, scaled to this market's home value. BLS publishes the three bundled and they cannot be split.
Both are priced off the same month's home value, so they rise with the market. Neither is a quote — a specific home's bill depends on its assessment, its age and its insurer.
Living in Aptos, Santa Cruz County, California
Aptos, in Santa Cruz County, had 6,664 people in the 2020 census. Half its households earn more than $134,048 a year and half less, against $111,093 across Santa Cruz County; 6% of its people live below the poverty line. 71% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 29% are rented. Unemployment in Santa Cruz County was 5.3% in August 2026, and the county had 0.1% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then shops.
Written by AI Claude Sonnet 5.5 wrote this on 23 October 2026 from the figures here, a list of nearby places and what it knows. It can be wrong or out of date.
What it’s like
The place. Aptos is a small community on the coast of Santa Cruz County, where most homes are lived in by their owners and typical home values and rents run high. Household incomes are above the county's, fewer people live below the poverty line than you might expect for the region, and many adults hold a four-year degree. Winters are cool and mild, summers are comfortably warm, snow is rare, and the rain is moderate.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, and in shops, with others in professional and business services or in restaurants and hotels. Cabrillo College, Safeway and Sutter Bay Medical Foundation are among the largest workplaces in Aptos. Across Santa Cruz County, jobs have dipped slightly over the past year and unemployment is a little lower than it was a year ago. Commutes are fairly short, and a good number of people work from home.
Things to do. Seacliff State Beach is in or beside town, and Manresa State Beach and Natural Bridges State Beach are both a short drive away. The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park, a protected area of redwood woodland, is also a short drive away. For a longer outing, the Monterey Bay Aquarium is a longer drive away.
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- 2,502households
- 50%of adults have a degree
- 6%below the poverty line
- 25 mintypical commute
- 18%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Santa Cruz County had 104,438 jobs in 2025, 0.1% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 62° and lows near 41°; warmest in September, with highs near 77° and lows near 53°. About 31 inches of rain a year, and little or no snow.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Santa Cruz weather station, 6 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Aptos
- Cabrillo CollegeTwo-year college780
- SafewaySupermarkets and other grocery stores110
- Aegis of AptosOld age homes without nursing care92
- AptosMail and parcel delivery35
- Sutter Bay Medical FoundationHealthcare30
- Testorff ConstructionHousing, single-family, construction general contractors21
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 5 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 288 people in all. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24). Not listed: many offices and banks, which need not report to OSHA; military bases, whose staff OPM withholds; and, in about half the states, city and county governments.
Natural hazards
- EarthquakesRelatively high
- WildfireRelatively moderate
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Aptos’ census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively high. It is meant for planning, not a substitute for a local risk assessment or a flood map: FEMA’s index.
From the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 census and its American Community Survey (2020–2024 five-year estimates), and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A survey, so each figure has a margin of error, and figures it is not sure of are left out. More on Santa Cruz County and the Santa Cruz-Watsonville, CA metro.
Aptos home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Aptos$1,319,589
- California$761,538
- United States$366,157
Levy by levy, and a check of one home’s own bill, the site covers Ohio’s property tax.
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 4 Aptos listings, and the typical home goes pending in 33 days — the market is roughly in balance.
When this market ran hot
Each cell is that month's year-on-year home-value growth. Read left to right, top row is the latest year — the 2021–22 band is the boom.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Share of listings with a price cut
The early-warning dial: sellers cut when buyers stop reaching. Rising cuts cool a market months before prices notice.
- Aptos27.91%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Aptos33
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Aptos121
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Aptos32
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Aptos$1,272,372
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Aptos98.07%
Zip codes with a Aptos address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Aptos — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.