Kensington, California.
Typical home $1,490,293 (+5.3% in a year). San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$3,802 (+95%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $75,054 +5%
- $1,415,239$1,490,293 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $111,638 +8%
- $1,378,655$1,490,293 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.
- Kensington$7,822
- California$3,997
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 45 years.
Typical home values in Kensington, CA rose 5.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Kensington, Contra Costa County, California
Kensington, in Contra Costa County, had 5,428 people in the 2020 census. Half its households earn more than $237,130 a year and half less, against $127,229 across Contra Costa County; 4% of its people live below the poverty line. 87% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 13% are rented. Unemployment in Contra Costa County was 5.0% in August 2026, and the county had 0.1% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in professional services, then schools and health care.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Kensington is a small community where most homes are lived in by their owners, and where incomes run well above the county's, with few households living below the poverty line. Residents are older than in many places, and nearly everyone who is an adult holds a four-year degree. Winters are cool and wet, summers mild, and snow is rare.
Work. Many residents work in professional and business services, in schools, hospitals and social care, or in restaurants, hotels and entertainment, and working from home is common, more so than in many places. Across Contra Costa County, some of the largest workplaces are West Contra Costa Unified, Contra Costa Regional Medical Center and San Ramon Valley Unified. Commutes for those who travel to work are fairly long.
Things to do. A short drive away are the USS Hornet, a museum ship, and Coit Tower, a well-known tourist attraction, along with Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, now a museum. A longer drive brings you to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and to Golden Gate Park, a large public garden.
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- 2,144households
- 84%of adults have a degree
- 4%below the poverty line
- 33 mintypical commute
- 54%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Contra Costa County had 374,448 jobs in 2025, 0.1% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 59° and lows near 43°; warmest in September, with highs near 76° and lows near 54°. About 26 inches of rain a year, and little or no snow.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Berkeley weather station, 2 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Contra Costa County
- West Contra Costa UnifiedSchool district2,751FTE
- Contra Costa Regional Medical CenterGeneral hospital2,584FTE
- San Ramon Valley UnifiedSchool district2,519FTE
- 24 Hour Home CareSenior citizens centers2,496
- Mt. Diablo UnifiedSchool district2,466FTE
- John Muir Medical Center - WCGeneral hospital2,143FTE
- Antioch UnifiedSchool district1,552FTE
- JT Thorpe and SonRefractory fireproofing1,523
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 573 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 81,677 people in all across the county; Kensington has none of its own. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24) and hospitals from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023); 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
- EarthquakesRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Kensington’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 Contra Costa County and the San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, CA metro.
Kensington home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Kensington$1,490,293
- California$761,538
- United States$366,157
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.
- Kensington11
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Kensington7
Zip codes with a Kensington address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Kensington — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zillow publishes no zip-level series with this city on the address.