Mecca, California.
Typical home $335,638 (+0.7% in a year). Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,029 (+140%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $2,492 +1%
- $333,146$335,638 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $86,745 +35%
- $248,893$335,638 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.
- Mecca$1,762
- California$3,997
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 12 years.
Typical home values in Mecca, CA rose 0.7% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Mecca, Riverside County, California
Mecca, in Riverside County, had 8,219 people in the 2020 census. Half its households earn more than $48,312 a year and half less, against $93,074 across Riverside County; 18% of its people live below the poverty line. 54% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 46% are rented. Unemployment in Riverside County was 6.2% in August 2026, and the county had 0.7% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in farming, then schools and health care.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Mecca is a small community in the Coachella Valley, in the desert of southeastern Riverside County. Its residents are younger than across much of the country, and incomes run well below the county's, with more people living below the poverty line than is typical. Fewer adults hold a four-year degree than in most places, and more homes are lived in by their owners than by renters.
Work. Many residents work in farming, which fits the valley's long agricultural character, and many others work in schools, hospitals and social care, in professional and business services, or in restaurants and hotels. Unemployment across Riverside County is about where it was a year ago, and the county has added a small number of jobs. Among the largest workplaces across the county are the school district Corona-Norco Unified, the University of California-Riverside and Amazon's warehousing operations. Commutes are on the long side, and very few people work from home.
Things to do. A short drive away, Valerie Jean Dates is a date garden, and North Shore Beach and Yacht Club is listed as a museum on the edge of the Salton Sea. Joshua Tree National Park, the best known place nearby, is a longer drive away, as is the Salton Sea itself, a large inland lake. Winters are mild and dry, summers are extremely hot, and snow is rare, so cooler months suit outdoor trips best.
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- 2,186households
- 5%of adults have a degree
- 18%below the poverty line
- 28 mintypical commute
- 3%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Riverside County had 846,070 jobs in 2025, 0.7% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 69° and lows near 42°; warmest in July, with highs near 107° and lows near 80°. About 3 inches of rain a year, and little or no snow.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Mecca Fire Station weather station, under a mile away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Riverside County
- University of California-RiversideUniversity or college4,684
- Corona-Norco UnifiedSchool district4,333FTE
- AmazonGeneral warehousing and storage4,330
- Riverside UnifiedSchool district3,906FTE
- Riverside University Health SystemGeneral hospital3,902FTE
- Eisenhower Medical CenterGeneral hospital3,892FTE
- Moreno Valley UnifiedSchool district3,304FTE
- AmazonGeneral warehousing and storage3,218
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 1,391 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 229,739 people in all across the county; Mecca has one of its own. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24), school districts 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
- Inland floodingRelatively high
- Heat wavesRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Mecca’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 Riverside County and the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA metro.
Mecca home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Mecca$335,638
- 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.
Zip codes with a Mecca address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Mecca — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.