What can you buy in Cambrian for about $1.25 million?

Published February 21, 2020 | By Mary Pope-Handy

Silicon Valley home prices are sky high, if lower than the peak of the market in Spring 2018. The median sale price of houses across all of Santa Clara County as of February is $1,182,000, and the average is about $1,449,000. Would you be able to buy a house in Cambrian for that sale price, or a little lower? If so, what would it look like? What can you buy in Cambrian for about $1.25 million today? Here we’ll consider the cost of Cambrian housing.

Cambrian offers good schools, a reasonable commute to places like Apple in Cupertino, and a nice location near Los Gatos and Campbell with lower real estate prices than those two areas. For that reason, it’s become a magnet for smart home buyers over the last 20 years. If you have the budget for a median priced Santa Clara County home, how far would it go in Cambrian? Here’s the data, pulled this week from MLSListings, to answer that question.

For the charts below: CUHSD refers to Campbell Union High School District, and SJUSD is San Jose Unified School District. Cambrian housing is most expensive in the Union SD, 2nd priciest is Cambrian, and most affordable is San Jose Unified.

I need to add something very important here about the cost of Cambrian housing, and that’s that the numbers above reflect CLOSED prices.

Pending sales right now are usually higher. Many homes with Union Schools especially, but in all areas, are experiencing multiple offers and overbids. In some cases, homes are selling for $250,000 or $300,000 over list price.

Houses that had been modest 3 bed, 2 bath, 1250 SF homes that were selling for about $1,250,000 are now often selling for $1,350,000 or more, depending on walkability, lot size, and of course condition.

Despite what the closed numbers say, it is very difficult to find a house in Cambrian with Union or Cambrian schools that will actually sell for under $1.3 now. Cambrian housing prices are going through the roof at this point, particularly in areas with the best schools.

In the chart above, there’s a clear price jump when you go from the SJUSD into the CUHSD. More properties are also available in the CUHSD. While CUHSD has the higher sales prices, it’s the small SJUSD area in zip code 95124 that has the highest average price per square foot of all sectors. The same school district in zip code 95118 shows the lowest average price per square foot by a significant amount.

Below is a similar chart with statistics from data gathered November 14, 2019:

This time, zip code 95124 within the Cambrian schools show the highest average price per square foot of all sectors, but the same zip code in San Jose schools shows the lowest by a significant amount. Since Cambrian housing costs are shooting up like a geyser right now, expect these numbers to jump up dramatically a month from now.

Below is another chart with statistics from April 11, 2019.

Back in April, prices were up in both school districts, though more significantly in the Cambrian schools.

A similar chart from June 21, 2017 shows you a little more perspective. Prices are still up in November 2019 compared to where they were in June of 2017.

When you take late 2017 and early 2018 out of the equation, it looks like “mild appreciation” between June 2017 and now – and that’s not bad!

Homes in 95118 tend to be younger and bigger than those in 95124, but the 95124 area is generally preferred as the schools are usually better (Union or Cambrian Elementary Districts and Campbell Union High School District vs San Jose Unified schools, though some of these are quite good, too) and 95124 is closer to Campbell and Los Gatos.

However, if someone is commuting to downtown San Jose, 95118 would be more convenient. The most expensive homes tend to be in 95124 with CUHSD. One caveat to this data is the quantity of results – Cambrian in the SJUSD has far fewer sales than CUHSD, and sometimes can be so low the data is unreliable. The smallest inventory for one of these categories this week was 6 in the SJUSD 95124 area.

It is very possible to buy a single family house at this price point today. If you’re interested in buying or selling a Cambrian home, please reach out to me! mary@popehandy.com or 408 204-7673 Also, be sure to view my article on the Cambrian Park real estate market update, which features listing and sales data, trends & statistics, some of which you won’t find anywhere but here on the Valley of Heart’s Delight blog.