Clifton, Colorado.
Typical home $328,964 (+0.6% in a year), asking rent $1,385 (+2.7%). Grand Junction, CO metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,000 (+138%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $1,927 +1%
- $327,036$328,964 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $70,376 +27%
- $258,588$328,964 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.
- Clifton$1,727
- Colorado$2,777
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 14 years.
Typical home values in Clifton, CO rose 0.6% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Clifton, CO rose 2.7% over the past year — in step with the nation.
Owning the typical home in Clifton runs $798/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $880 in May 2025.
That is $2,183 a month against $1,385 rent: a $1,727 mortgage payment, plus $104 property tax and $352 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Clifton
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$2,183
- Renting$1,385
- Mortgage only$1,727
Property tax · $104/mo 0.38% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Mesa County, CO
Insurance & upkeep · $352/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 Clifton, Mesa County, Colorado
Clifton, in Mesa County, had 20,413 people in the 2020 census. Half its households earn more than $52,100 a year and half less, against $73,658 across Mesa County; 15% of its people live below the poverty line. 73% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 27% are rented. Unemployment in Mesa County was 4.6% in August 2026, and the county had 0.1% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then construction.
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. Clifton is a community in Mesa County where most homes are lived in by their owners, and the population is somewhat younger than in many American towns. Household incomes run below the county's, and a four-year degree is less common among adults than in much of the country. Winters are cold, with a little snow, and summers are hot and dry.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, the building trades, shops and manufacturing. Some of the largest workplaces in Clifton are Ranch and Home Supply, apeiron utility construction and Traffic Control Specialists. The usual commute is fairly short, and a good number of people work from home.
Things to do. James M. Robb – Colorado River State Park, a protected area, and Cross Orchards Historic Site, a museum, are both in or beside town. A short drive away, the Gunnison River offers time by the water. Colorado National Monument, a protected area, is a longer drive away.
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- 7,784households
- 13%of adults have a degree
- 15%below the poverty line
- 22 mintypical commute
- 14%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Mesa County had 66,902 jobs in 2025, 0.1% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 39° and lows near 19°; warmest in July, with highs near 93° and lows near 65°. About 13 inches of snow and 9 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Grand Junction 6ESE weather station, 2 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Clifton
- Ranch and Home SupplyRetail92
- apeiron utility constructionFiber optic cable transmission line construction45
- Traffic Control SpecialistsFlagging services40
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 3 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 177 people in all. 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
- LightningVery high
- Winter weatherRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Clifton’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, very low. 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 Mesa County and the Grand Junction, CO metro.
Clifton home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Clifton$328,964
- Colorado$529,013
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Clifton listings — the market is cooling.
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.
- Clifton33.11%
- United States26.90%
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Clifton60
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Clifton19
Zip codes with a Clifton address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Clifton — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.