Grass Valley, California.
Typical home $507,900 (+1.0% in a year), asking rent $2,227 (+0.9%). Truckee-Grass Valley, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,151 (+76%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $5,157 +1%
- $502,743$507,900 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Down $2,635 -1%
- $510,535$507,900 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.
- Grass Valley$2,666
- California$3,997
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, prices here aren't rising.
Typical home values in Grass Valley, CA rose 1.0% over the past year — in step with the nation.
Asking rents in Grass Valley, CA rose 0.9% over the past year — slower than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Grass Valley runs $1,302/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $1,758 in Oct 2023.
That is $3,529 a month against $2,227 rent: a $2,666 mortgage payment, plus $320 property tax and $544 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Grass Valley
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$3,529
- Renting$2,227
- Mortgage only$2,666
Property tax · $320/mo 0.75% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Nevada County, CA
Insurance & upkeep · $544/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 Grass Valley, Nevada County, California
Grass Valley is a city of 14,016 people in Nevada County. Half its households earn more than $51,764 a year and half less, against $89,882 across Nevada County; 22% of its people live below the poverty line. 40% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 60% are rented. Unemployment in Nevada County was 5.0% in August 2026, and the county had 1.1% 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. Grass Valley is a small city in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and its residents are older than in much of the country. Incomes here run well below the county's, more people live below the poverty line than most would expect, and more households rent than own their homes. Winters are cold, though milder than in the high mountains, with some snow each year, while summers turn warm; the town also gets a good deal of rain and melted snow over the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with shops, manufacturing and other services close behind. Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital, the Nevada County Office of Education schools and AJA Video Systems are among the largest workplaces in town. Commutes are short, and a fair number of people work from home.
Things to do. Empire Mine State Historic Park sits in or beside town, as does the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad & Transportation Museum. A short drive away are the Nevada Theatre and South Yuba River State Park, where the river is a draw for walking and swimming. Those willing to go a longer drive can reach New Bullards Bar Reservoir.
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- 6,769households
- 33%of adults have a degree
- 22%below the poverty line
- 17 mintypical commute
- 15%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Nevada County had 34,626 jobs in 2025, 1.1% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 53° and lows near 33°; warmest in July, with highs near 88° and lows near 58°. About 9 inches of snow and 53 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Grass Valley #2 weather station, a mile away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Grass Valley
- Sierra Nevada Memorial HospitalGeneral hospital563FTE
- Nevada County Office of Education SchoolsSchool district213FTE
- AJA Video SystemsBroadcast equipment, for radio and television, manufacturing188
- Spring Hill ManorSkilled nursing facilities160
- Chapa-DeHealth care151
- Jada WindowsFrames, door and window, metal, manufacturing150
- SafewaySupermarkets and other grocery stores145
- TargetDiscount department stores139
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 26 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 2,770 people in all. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) and school districts 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
- WildfireRelatively high
- Inland floodingRelatively high
- AvalanchesRelatively moderate
- EarthquakesRelatively moderate
- Lightningrelatively high in parts of Grass ValleyRelatively 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 Grass Valley’s 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 Nevada County and the Truckee-Grass Valley, CA metro.
Grass Valley home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Grass Valley$507,900
- 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 Grass Valley listings, and the typical home goes pending in 16 days — the market is heating up.
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.
- Grass Valley26.40%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Grass Valley16
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Grass Valley206
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Grass Valley59
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Grass Valley$541,052
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Grass Valley100.29%
Zip codes with a Grass Valley address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Grass Valley — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Grass Valley
| Zip activate to sort by Zip | Place activate to sort by Place | Population sorted descending, activate to sort ascending | Rent activate to sort by Rent | Home value activate to sort by Home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 95945 | Grass Valley | 27,470 | $2,022 | $481,139 |
| 95949 | Grass Valley | 20,552 | $3,000 | $536,641 |