Columbia, California.
Typical home $403,522 (+0.4% in a year). Sonora, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$838 (+65%) since Feb 2021.
- 1 year
- Up $1,455 +0%
- $402,066$403,522 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Down $12,218 -3%
- $415,740$403,522 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.
- Columbia$2,118
- California$3,997
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, prices here aren't rising.
Typical home values in Columbia, CA rose 0.4% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Columbia, Tuolumne County, California
Columbia, in Tuolumne County, had 2,577 people in the 2020 census. Half its households earn more than $58,520 a year and half less, against $77,404 across Tuolumne County; 16% of its people live below the poverty line. 70% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 30% are rented. Unemployment in Tuolumne County was 5.6% in August 2026, and the county had 0.9% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most people in Tuolumne County work in schools and health care, then restaurants and hotels.
Written by AI Claude Sonnet 5.5 wrote this on 24 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Columbia is a small community in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and most homes here are lived in by their owners. Incomes run below those across Tuolumne County, and a fair number of households live under the poverty line. Winters are mild and rarely bring snow, summers turn hot, and the year brings a moderate amount of rain and melted snow.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, in restaurants, hotels and entertainment, in professional and business services, and in government. Across Tuolumne County, the largest workplaces include Adventist Health Sonora, Chicken Ranch Casino and Rush Creek Lodge. Unemployment across the county is unchanged from a year earlier, and the number of jobs has grown slightly.
Things to do. Columbia State Historic Park is a protected area in or beside town. A short drive away are Moaning Cavern, a tourist attraction, and Railtown 1897 State Historic Park, a museum. For a longer outing, Stanislaus National Forest is a protected area a longer drive away.
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- 993households
- 24%of adults have a degree
- 16%below the poverty line
What people in Tuolumne County work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Tuolumne County had 18,392 jobs in 2025, 0.9% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 57° and lows near 38°; warmest in July, with highs near 97° and lows near 65°. About 30 inches of rain a year, and little or no snow.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the New Melones Dam Headquarters weather station, 4 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Tuolumne County
- Adventist Health SonoraGeneral hospital872FTE
- Chicken Ranch Casino721120 casino hotels786
- casinoCasinos488
- Rush Creek LodgeHotels with golf courses, tennis courts, and/or other health spa facilities350
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters340
- Evergreen LodgeHotels with golf courses, tennis courts, and/or other health spa facilities247
- Columbia CollegeTwo-year college204
- SPISawmills180
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 32 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 4,732 people in all across the county; Columbia has two of its own. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) and colleges from IPEDS (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
- WildfireVery high
- Heat wavesRelatively high
- LightningRelatively high
- DroughtRelatively moderate
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
- Winter weatherRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Columbia’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 Tuolumne County and the Sonora, CA metro.
Columbia home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Columbia$403,522
- 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.
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
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Columbia6
Zip codes with a Columbia address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Columbia — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.