Union City, California.
Typical home $1,195,668 (-1.9% in a year), asking rent $2,913 (+7.8%). San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, CA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$3,134 (+100%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Down $23,385 -2%
- $1,219,053$1,195,668 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $88,689 +8%
- $1,106,980$1,195,668 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.
- Union City$6,276
- 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 Union City, CA fell 1.9% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Union City, CA rose 7.8% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Union City runs $5,418/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $6,515 in Jan 2025.
That is $8,330 a month against $2,913 rent: a $6,276 mortgage payment, plus $775 property tax and $1,280 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Union City
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$8,330
- Renting$2,913
- Mortgage only$6,276
Property tax · $775/mo 0.78% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Alameda County, CA
Insurance & upkeep · $1,280/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 Union City, Alameda County, California
Union City is a city of 70,143 people in Alameda County. Half its households earn more than $133,715 a year and half less, against $129,367 across Alameda County; 7% of its people live below the poverty line. 65% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 35% are rented. Unemployment in Union City was 4.7% in August 2026, and Alameda County had 0.9% 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. Union City is a city in Alameda County where most homes are lived in by their owners, and household incomes run a little above the county's. The population is middle-aged, and a good share of adults hold a four-year degree. Winters are mild, with the coldest days in December still cool rather than freezing, and snow is rare. Summers stay comfortably warm, September being the warmest month, and the year brings little rain.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, professional and business services, manufacturing, and shops. Within the city, some of the largest workplaces are Mizuho Orthopedic Systems, which makes surgical supplies, Zoetis, which makes diagnostic equipment, and the City of Union City itself. The commute to work is fairly long, and a sizable number of people work from home. Unemployment is a little lower than a year ago, though across Alameda County there are slightly fewer jobs than the year before.
Things to do. The better-known places nearby are all a longer drive away. Among them are the California Academy of Sciences, an aquarium and science museum in San Francisco, Golden Gate Park, a large public garden, and the Computer History Museum, which is worth a day for anyone curious about the machines behind modern life. Ballgame outings are an option too, with Levi's Stadium among the best known of the area's stadiums.
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- 21,240households
- 45%of adults have a degree
- 7%below the poverty line
- 32 mintypical commute
- 19%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Alameda County had 783,094 jobs in 2025, 0.9% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 58° and lows near 42°; warmest in September, with highs near 78° and lows near 56°. About 16 inches of rain a year, and little or no snow.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Fremont weather station, 4 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Union City
- Mizuho Orthopedic Systems, Inc. (Mizuho OSI)Surgical supplies manufacturing572
- Zoetis (Formerly Abaxis)Electromedical diagnostic equipment manufacturing492
- City of Union CityExecutive and legislative office combinations324
- La Terra FinaFood manufacturing269
- Western Allied MechanicalPumping system, water, installation264
- Emerald PackagingFlexible packaging, plastics film, manufacturing250
- Southern Glazers Wine & SpiritsWine and distilled alcoholic beverage merchant wholesalers231
- 1st Class LaundryLaundry services, industrial200
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 52 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 5,775 people in all. 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
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Union City’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 Alameda County and the San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, CA metro.
Union City home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Union City$1,195,668
- California$761,538
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 4 Union City listings, and the typical home goes pending in 28 days — the market is cooling.
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.
- Union City27.16%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Union City28
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Union City88
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Union City30
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Union City$1,181,707
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Union City101.21%
Zip codes with a Union City address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Union City — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.