Chowchilla, California.
Typical home $387,180 (+1.3% in a year), asking rent $2,400 . Madera, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,105 (+119%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $5,094 +1%
- $382,086$387,180 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $63,658 +20%
- $323,523$387,180 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.
- Chowchilla$2,032
- California$3,997
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 19 years.
Typical home values in Chowchilla, CA rose 1.3% over the past year — in step with the nation.
Living in Chowchilla, Madera County, California
Chowchilla is a city of 19,039 people in Madera County. Half its households earn more than $66,514 a year and half less, against $76,627 across Madera County; 20% of its people live below the poverty line. 57% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 43% are rented. Unemployment in Madera County was 7.4% in August 2026, and the county had 2.1% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then restaurants and hotels.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Chowchilla is a small city in the San Joaquin Valley, in Madera County, with a younger population than many American towns. Incomes run below the county's, and more people here live below the poverty line than most would expect, while a good share of households own their homes. Fewer adults hold a four-year degree than in many places, and most people drive a fair way to work.
Work. Residents work mainly in schools, hospitals and social care, in restaurants, hotels and entertainment, in farming, and in shops. The biggest workplaces in town include the Central California Women's Facility, the Chowchilla Elementary Schools and CertainTeed. Unemployment across Madera County is no different from a year ago, and the county has added a few more jobs.
Things to do. Lake Corcoran, a lake, and Mariposa Creek, a river, are both a short drive away. A longer drive brings you to Castle Air Museum, a museum of aircraft, and to Lake Yosemite, another lake. Winters are cool and summers are hot, with little rain across the year.
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- 4,161households
- 16%of adults have a degree
- 20%below the poverty line
- 26 mintypical commute
- 8%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Madera County had 58,077 jobs in 2025, 2.1% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 56° and lows near 38°; warmest in July, with highs near 98° and lows near 63°. About 11 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Madera Municipal Airport weather station, 11 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Chowchilla
- Cental California Women's FacilityCorrectional institutions1,248
- Chowchilla Elementary SchoolsSchool district245FTE
- CertainTeedFiberglass insulation products manufacturing208
- Chowchilla Union High SchoolsSchool district119FTE
- Guerrero Labor ContractorLabor contractors, farm116
- ChowchillaMail and parcel delivery28
- Chowchilla Water DistrictIrrigation water delivery28
- Oldcastle InfrastructureOther concrete product manufacturing26
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 9 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 1,718 people in all. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24); FTE marks full-time equivalent staff. 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
- Heat wavesRelatively high
- EarthquakesRelatively high
- Inland floodingrelatively high in parts of ChowchillaRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Chowchilla’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively moderate. 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 Madera County and the Madera, CA metro.
Chowchilla home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Chowchilla$387,180
- 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 Chowchilla listings — 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.
- Chowchilla23.38%
- United States26.90%
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Chowchilla70
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Chowchilla12
Zip codes with a Chowchilla address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Chowchilla — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.