Newton, Massachusetts.
Typical home $1,482,662 (+1.9% in a year), asking rent $3,358 (+2.9%). Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$4,052 (+109%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $27,166 +2%
- $1,455,495$1,482,662 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $325,161 +28%
- $1,157,501$1,482,662 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.
- Newton$7,782
- Massachusetts$3,439
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 14 years.
Typical home values in Newton, MA rose 1.9% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Newton, MA rose 2.9% over the past year — in step with the nation.
Owning the typical home in Newton runs $7,285/mo more than renting one — the widest that gap has been in this data.
That is $10,643 a month against $3,358 rent: a $7,782 mortgage payment, plus $1,273 property tax and $1,587 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Newton
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$10,643
- Renting$3,358
- Mortgage only$7,782
Property tax · $1,273/mo 1.03% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Middlesex County, MA
Insurance & upkeep · $1,587/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 Newton, Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Newton is a city of 88,923 people in Middlesex County. Half its households earn more than $190,304 a year and half less, against $130,847 across Middlesex County; 4% of its people live below the poverty line. 70% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 30% are rented. Unemployment in Newton was 3.7% in August 2026, and Middlesex County had 2.4% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then professional services.
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. Newton is a city just outside Boston, made up of a number of separate villages, and most of its homes are lived in by their owners. Incomes run well above the county's, and very few residents live below the poverty line. Nearly all adults hold a four-year degree, and the typical home costs far more than most places in the country, with rents to match. Winters are cold and snowy, summers are warm, and the year brings a fair amount of rain and melted snow.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, in professional and business services, or in banks, insurance and property. Boston College, Newton Wellesley Hospital and Newton Schools are among the largest workplaces in the city. A good share of people work from home, and those who commute face a drive of moderate length. Across Middlesex County, there were somewhat fewer jobs last year than the year before, and unemployment in Newton is a little lower than it was a year ago.
Things to do. Boston's big museums are a short drive away, including the Museum of Fine Arts Boston and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Fenway Park, the baseball stadium, is also a short drive away. For a quieter outing, Walden Pond is a reservoir a short drive away.
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- 32,194households
- 81%of adults have a degree
- 4%below the poverty line
- 27 mintypical commute
- 32%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Middlesex County had 903,942 jobs in 2025, 2.4% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 37° and lows near 19°; warmest in July, with highs near 85° and lows near 64°. About 49 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Jamaica Plain weather station, 5 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Newton
- Boston CollegeUniversity or college4,526
- Newton Wellesley HospitalGeneral hospital2,372FTE
- Newton SchoolsSchool district2,055FTE
- Mass General BrighamHome health care agencies1,139
- JccgbCommunity centers, youth583
- Sonesta International Hotel538
- Wegmans Food MarketsRetail supermarkets497
- Lasell UniversityUniversity or college416
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 41 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 10,986 people in all. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24), hospitals 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
- Ice stormsRelatively moderate
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Newton’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively 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 Middlesex County and the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metro.
Newton home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Newton$1,482,662
- Massachusetts$655,219
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 5 Newton listings, and the typical home goes pending in 19 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.
- Newton21.97%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Newton19
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Newton268
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Newton85
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Newton$1,471,780
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Newton100.93%
Zip codes with a Newton address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Newton — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Newton
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 02459 | Newton Center | 18,449 | $4,115 | $1,791,267 |
| 02458 | Newton | 13,050 | $2,954 | $1,232,418 |
| 02465 | West Newton | 11,697 | $3,155 | $1,353,462 |
| 02460 | Newtonville | 10,099 | $3,379 | $1,344,401 |
| 02466 | Auburndale | 8,679 | $3,636 | $1,372,997 |
| 02461 | Newton Highlands | 6,975 | $4,254 | $1,475,376 |
| 02468 | Waban | 5,773 | — | $2,097,651 |
| 02464 | Newton Upper Falls | 3,833 | $3,100 | $925,130 |
| 02462 | Newton Lower Falls | 1,470 | — | $1,295,580 |