Surprise, Arizona.
Typical home $416,014 (-1.7% in a year), asking rent $1,942 (+1.1%). Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,128 (+107%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Down $7,329 -2%
- $423,343$416,014 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $6,412 +2%
- $409,602$416,014 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.
- Surprise$2,184
- Arizona$2,187
- United States$1,922
Typical home values in Surprise, AZ fell 1.7% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Surprise, AZ rose 1.1% over the past year — slower than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Surprise runs $839/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $1,245 in Oct 2022.
That is $2,781 a month against $1,942 rent: a $2,184 mortgage payment, plus $152 property tax and $445 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Surprise
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$2,781
- Renting$1,942
- Mortgage only$2,184
Property tax · $152/mo 0.44% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Maricopa County, AZ
Insurance & upkeep · $445/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 Surprise, Maricopa County, Arizona
Surprise is a city of 143,148 people in Maricopa County. Half its households earn more than $96,711 a year and half less, against $89,300 across Maricopa County; 9% of its people live below the poverty line. 79% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 21% are rented. Unemployment in Surprise was 5.1% in August 2026, and Maricopa County had 0.4% more 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. Surprise is a large city in Maricopa County, with a population that has grown to well beyond what a town of its age would once have held. Households here earn more than across the county, and most homes are lived in by their owners rather than rented. Winters are mild and summers are very hot, with little or no snow and not much rain through the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, in shops, in banks, insurance and property, and in professional and business services. The largest workplaces in Surprise include the Dysart Unified School District, MMR Constructors and Walmart. A fair number of people work from home, and the typical commute is a fairly long one.
Things to do. Close by, Surprise Stadium is a short drive away, as are Wildlife World Zoo and White Tank Mountain Regional Park, a protected area of desert hills. For a bigger outing, State Farm Stadium is a longer drive away.
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- 56,506households
- 30%of adults have a degree
- 9%below the poverty line
- 30 mintypical commute
- 20%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Maricopa County had 2,289,324 jobs in 2025, 0.4% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 64° and lows near 39°; warmest in July, with highs near 105° and lows near 77°. About 10 inches of rain a year, and little or no snow.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Wittmann 1SE weather station, 8 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Surprise
- Dysart Unified District (4243)School district2,362FTE
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters403
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters388
- Crescent Crown Distributing_SurpriseFermented malt beverages merchant wholesalers307
- JanusDoors, metal, manufacturing253
- TargetDiscount department stores247
- Iris USAOrganizers for closets, drawers, and shelves, plastics, manufacturing230
- Fry's Food Stores of ArizonaSupermarkets and other grocery except convenience stores228
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 56 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 6,105 people in all. School districts come 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
- Heat wavesVery high
- Inland floodingRelatively high
- HailRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Surprise’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 Maricopa County and the Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ metro.
Surprise home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Surprise$416,014
- Arizona$416,733
- 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 3 Surprise listings, and the typical home goes pending in 41 days — the market is roughly in balance.
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.
- Surprise31.14%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Surprise41
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Surprise1,141
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Surprise311
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Surprise$404,749
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Surprise98.76%
Zip codes with a Surprise address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Surprise — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Surprise
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 85379 | Surprise | 51,035 | $2,036 | $419,290 |
| 85374 | Surprise | 41,420 | $1,641 | $381,833 |
| 85388 | Surprise | 35,369 | $2,146 | $443,841 |
| 85387 | Surprise | 22,442 | $2,177 | $451,098 |
| 85378 | Surprise | 9,765 | $1,892 | $329,961 |