This guide to Santa Monica real estate covers a city on Santa Monica Bay in Los Angeles County, with about 8.4 square miles of land and a 3-mile coastline (ZIP codes 90401 to 90411). Santa Monica borders Pacific Palisades to the north, Venice to the south, and Brentwood and West Los Angeles to the east. Read on for the city’s history, how to get around, and where to find parks, shopping and dining. Current prices, rents, schools and weather follow, each with its source and date. Santa Monica is one of the communities in the Westside section of this site.
Santa Monica Real Estate By The Numbers
Santa Monica
Data Refreshed Oct 18, 2026
Area Score
43%
Area Score
Based on 3 measures Compared with 40 other Los Angeles-area communities
What Is Behind The Score
Price Growth
+4.2% / yr
Rent Yield
2.5% / yr
Rental Demand
7.9% rentals vacant
Zillow through Sep 30, 2026; Census Bureau survey years 2020 to 2024. Combines ZIP codes 90401, 90402, 90403, 90404, 90405. A comparison of housing-market numbers only. It is not a rating of the area, its people or its schools, and it is not investment advice.
Typical Home Value
$1,283,279
−3.6% vs. last year
Zillow, through Sep 30, 2026
Single-Family Home Value
$2,725,931
−3.9% vs. last year
Zillow, same date
Condo Home Value
$1,008,847
−4.9% vs. last year
Zillow, same date
Bottom-Tier Home Value
$807,709
−3.7% vs. last year
Zillow, bottom tier (5th to 35th percentile), same date
Top-Tier Home Value
$3,418,045
−3.8% vs. last year
Zillow, top tier (65th to 95th percentile), same date
Typical Rent
$3,716
per month · +0.7% vs. last year
Zillow, ZIP code level, same date
Typical Home Value, Last 5 Years
−15.6%
Sep 2026 compared with Sep 2021
Sep 2021Sep 2026
Zillow monthly values. Los Angeles metro typical value: $950,020, so Santa Monica runs 35% higher.
Typical Home Value By Bedrooms
2 Bedrooms
$1,139,598
−3.3% vs. last year
Zillow, same date
3 Bedrooms
$1,917,729
+1.3% vs. last year
Zillow, same date
4 Bedrooms
Not available yet
Zillow has no figure for this ZIP code.
5+ Bedrooms
Not available yet
Zillow has no figure for this ZIP code.
Zillow publishes a typical value for homes by number of bedrooms. This box shows homes with 2, 3, 4, and 5 or more bedrooms.
Zillow’s bottom tier is the typical value of homes in the 5th to 35th percentile of values for the ZIP code, and its top tier is the 65th to 95th percentile. Typical Home Value is the middle of the range, the 35th to 65th percentile.
Zillow publishes values by ZIP code, so the Zillow figures here are for ZIP code 90401, the main ZIP code used for Santa Monica. Other ZIP codes in Santa Monica can differ.
Typical Rent
$3,716
per month · +0.7% vs. last year
Zillow, ZIP code level, through Sep 30, 2026
Median Gross Rent
$2,477
rent plus utilities
Census Bureau, survey years 2020 to 2024
Share Of Renters
95%
of occupied homes
Census Bureau, survey years 2020 to 2024
Typical Rent comes from Zillow. Median Gross Rent and Share Of Renters come from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (survey years 2020 to 2024), which averages five years, so Median Gross Rent runs behind today’s asking rents. Gross rent includes utilities. Median Gross Rent is left out when its margin of error is more than half the figure.
Typical Rent is for ZIP code 90401, the main ZIP code used for Santa Monica. The Census Bureau figures are for ZIP code 90401. Other ZIP codes in Santa Monica can differ.
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Counted from OpenStreetMap contributors’ map data, which depends on what volunteers have mapped, so a count can run low. Counted Oct 18, 2026.
Getting Around
Average Commute
23 min
one way, to work
Census Bureau, survey years 2020 to 2024
Work From Home
37%
of workers
Census Bureau, survey years 2020 to 2024
Nearest Rail Station
Downtown Santa Monica
Metro Rail · about 0.4 mi
OpenStreetMap contributors
The Census Bureau figures on this tab are for ZIP code 90401, the main ZIP code used for Santa Monica. Other ZIP codes in Santa Monica can differ.
Homes In The Area
Types Of Homes
Detached Houses 3%Attached Homes 0%2 To 4 Units 3%5 Or More Units 94%
Census Bureau, survey years 2020 to 2024. Other home types, such as mobile homes, are left out, so the parts may not add to 100%.
Climate
Average July High
69°F
1991 to 2020 average
Average January Low
50°F
1991 to 2020 average
Rain Per Year
12.2 in
1991 to 2020 average
From NOAA’s U.S. Climate Normals for the nearest weather station (Santa Monica Pier, about 0.6 mi away), so they describe that station and not this exact street.
Programs: Natural Resources Conservation and Research · Ethnic, Cultural Minority, Gender, and Group Studies · Communication and Media Studies · +59 more
Adult schools are public programs that offer classes for adults, such as high school diploma or equivalency courses and job training. Each school’s website lists its current classes.
Listed by distance, not ranked. K-12 schools and adult schools come from the California Department of Education school directory, which districts report themselves and which can be out of date (directory data as of Oct 16, 2026). Colleges, universities, trade schools and their programs come from the U.S. Department of Education’s College Scorecard files, which cover schools that take part in federal student aid. Smaller trade schools outside that program are not in the files; the Trade Schools view links to California’s own search pages for them. Which school a home is assigned to depends on the exact address, so confirm with the district. Ratings belong to Niche and GreatSchools; this box links to them and does not copy them.
Places within about three miles, from OpenStreetMap contributors’ map data, shown by how well documented they are and how close they sit, not ranked by quality. A name links to its official website only when OpenStreetMap lists one. Mapped Oct 18, 2026.
Zillow figures are for the latest month in each file. Census figures come from the 5-year survey. A dash means there is no exact figure: the source has none for that area, or reports only a range such as “$3,500+”. Difference shows how the second area compares with Santa Monica: a plus sign means higher, a minus sign means lower.
Data Sources: Zillow (Data Provided by Zillow Group) · Census Bureau · California Department of Education · U.S. Department of Education (College Scorecard) · OpenStreetMap contributors · NOAA (U.S. Climate Normals)
The Area Score compares this community with the other Los Angeles-area communities this site covers (the San Fernando Valley, the Westside, central Los Angeles and the Santa Clarita Valley). A community with more than one ZIP code uses all of them: each ZIP code’s home values and rents count in proportion to its number of homes (the Census Bureau’s home counts), and the empty rentals and rental homes of all of them are added together. Each measure is turned into a rank from 0 to 100, then the ranks are averaged. Price Growth is the change in Zillow’s typical home value over the last 12 months. Rent Yield is a year of Zillow’s typical rent divided by the typical home value. Rental Demand is how few rental homes sit empty, from the Census Bureau’s rental vacancy rate (fewer empty rentals ranks higher). If a measure has too little data for an area, it is left out and the score says how many measures it used. The score describes housing-market numbers only. It is not a rating of the people or the neighborhood, and it is not investment advice.
A Short History Of Santa Monica
The Tongva people are the area’s original inhabitants, and their village of Comicranga stood here. In 1839 the land became part of Rancho San Vicente y Santa Mónica, granted to Francisco Sepúlveda II. The city was founded in 1875 by John P. Jones and Robert Baker, together with Arcadia Bandini de Stearns Baker, and incorporated in 1886.
The Municipal Pier opened on September 9, 1909, and the adjoining Pleasure Pier was built in 1916 by Charles I. D. Looff and his son Arthur. The pier’s carousel, built in 1922 with 44 hand-carved horses, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and the pier has been a Santa Monica Historic Landmark since August 17, 1976. Pacific Park, the amusement park on the pier, opened on May 25, 1996. Aircraft are part of the story too: Douglas built a plant at Clover Field, now Santa Monica Airport, in 1922 and kept facilities in the city until the 1970s. The city owns and operates the airport today.
Getting Around Santa Monica
The Santa Monica Freeway (Interstate 10) begins in Santa Monica, State Route 2 begins here too, historic U.S. Route 66 has its western end here, and Interstate 405 runs just east of the city. The Metro E Line, a 21.9-mile light rail line that was called the Expo Line until late 2019, reaches Santa Monica with stations at Downtown Santa Monica, 17th Street/SMC and 26th Street/Bergamot. The extension from Culver City opened on May 20, 2016. Big Blue Bus, the city’s own bus service since 1928, serves Santa Monica, Westwood, Venice and the wider Westside. LAX is a few miles south, and the numbers section shows the closest rail station and its distance.
Parks, Beaches And Open Space
Santa Monica State Beach runs along the city’s 3-mile coastline. Palisades Park covers 26.4 acres along a 1.6-mile stretch of Ocean Avenue, from the Santa Monica Pier north to Adelaide Drive. It was established in 1892 and has views of the Pacific Ocean and the coastal mountains, along with a camera obscura, a rose garden and public art. Its bluffs are prone to erosion and landslides, and barriers keep visitors back from the edge. Tongva Park covers 6 acres between Ocean Avenue and Main Street, just south of Colorado Avenue. The numbers section also counts the parks, grocery stores, restaurants and coffee shops within one mile, using OpenStreetMap.
Shopping And Dining
Wikipedia lists three main shopping districts in Santa Monica: the Downtown District, Montana Avenue on the north side and Main Street at the south end. Third Street Promenade, in the downtown, is a pedestrian-only shopping street three blocks long between Wilshire Boulevard and Broadway. The pier hosts outdoor concerts and movies, and the Santa Monica Pier Corporation produces its Twilight Summer Concert Series.
Library, Schools And Local Groups
The Santa Monica Public Library’s Main Library is at 601 Santa Monica Blvd., with four neighborhood branches: Fairview at 2101 Ocean Park Blvd., Montana Avenue at 1704 Montana Ave., Ocean Park at 2601 Main St. and Pico Boulevard at 2201 Pico Blvd. The city is run by a seven-member city council elected at-large, working with a city manager. The numbers section lists nearby K-12 and adult schools, colleges and trade schools by distance, with links to their official pages. School attendance areas are set by the school district, so confirm them with the district for any address you are considering.
Look Up A Santa Monica Address
Free public tools let anyone check an address’s zoning and assessment details. The City of Santa Monica’s Zoning Lookup Application finds the zoning district for an address. The County Office of the Assessor also has a public portal for property assessment information.
Ask About Santa Monica
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