Oct 24, 2026·Norman Williams
Mid-century homes in Palm Springs: prices by tract
Mid-century in Palm Springs is not one market. It is a dozen tracts with different prices, land, and problems.
Short answer
Mid-century Palm Springs prices depend on the tract, the land tenure, and how much of the original house survives. Twin Palms, Vista Las Palmas, Racquet Club Estates, Sunmor, and Indian Canyons each trade differently. Compare within the tract, check whether the lot is leased, and inspect the roof, wiring, glass, slab plumbing, and pool before you fall for the clerestories.
Tract table
Source: CDAR/FlexMLS closed sales, Palm Springs single-family homes, searched by MLS subdivision. The main table covers closings October 25, 2025 through October 23, 2026 (the last 12 months). Racquet Club Estates appears in the MLS as "Racquet Club East," so that is the name in the table. One sale coded "18 at Twin Palms" is counted with Twin Palms. The MLS codes subdivisions, not builder tracts, so I cannot split out individual Alexander or Krisel tracts.
| Tract (MLS subdivision) | Sales | Median price | Median $/sq ft | Median DOM | Median year built | Leased land |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vista Las Palmas | 12 | $2,798,500 | $1,082 | 34 | 1960 | 0 |
| Old Las Palmas | 18 | $3,500,000 | $1,003 | 28 | 1952 | 0 |
| Twin Palms | 13 | $1,795,000 | $873 | 48 | 1958 | 1 |
| Racquet Club East | 25 | $948,000 | $673 | 53 | 1959 | 0 |
| Sunmor | 5 | $1,190,000 | $669 | 43 | 1959 | 0 |
| Indian Canyons | 23 | $2,006,000 | $664 | 39 | 1971 | 15 |
| Palm Springs, all single-family | 727 | $1,025,000 | $524 | 48 | 1978 | 71 |
| Palm Springs single-family built before 1970 | 266 | $1,085,000 | $613 | 39.5 | 1958 | 10 |
Sunmor's five sales and Vista Las Palmas's twelve are thin, so here is the full 24 months (closings October 24, 2024 through October 23, 2026):
| Tract (MLS subdivision) | Sales | Median price | Median $/sq ft | Median DOM | Leased land |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vista Las Palmas | 30 | $2,525,000 | $1,070 | 25.5 | 0 |
| Old Las Palmas | 32 | $3,750,000 | $991 | 25.5 | 0 |
| Twin Palms | 25 | $1,715,000 | $792 | 34 | 1 |
| Indian Canyons | 47 | $2,006,000 | $704 | 41 | 35 |
| Racquet Club East | 48 | $957,500 | $684 | 54 | 0 |
| Sunmor | 12 | $935,000 | $607 | 55 | 0 |
| Palm Springs, all single-family | 1,411 | $1,060,000 | $540 | 50 | 126 |
Every one of these tracts sold above the citywide single-family median per square foot, and above the pre-1970 citywide figure too. Indian Canyons is the leased-land tract: 15 of its 23 sales in the last year sat on leased land. For a feel-of-the-neighborhood comparison, see Vista Las Palmas, Twin Palms, Racquet Club Estates compared.
Restored vs remodeled-away
By "remodeled-away" I mean houses where the renovation erased what made them mid-century: the posts, the glass walls, the roofline. To get at this I ran a keyword screen on the public Marketing Remarks of the six tracts above. "Restored" means words like restored, original, preserved, or period-correct. "Remodeled" means remodeled, renovated, reimagined, transformed, or rebuilt. It measures how a house was marketed, not what an inspector would find.
| Remarks screen, six tracts | Last 12 months: sales | Median $/sq ft | Median DOM | 24 months: sales | Median $/sq ft | Median DOM |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Restoration language only | 19 | $730 | 55 | 39 | $758 | 77 |
| Remodel language only | 22 | $769 | 30 | 40 | $804 | 39 |
| Both | 26 | 50 | ||||
| Neither | 29 | 65 |
In these tracts, houses marketed on their remodel sold slightly higher per square foot and much faster than houses marketed on what survived. That is the reverse of what I expected. Two cautions. The remodel group skews toward pricier tracts (a median price of $2.3M against $1.06M for the restoration group over the last 12 months), so tract mix explains part of it. And the screen runs the other way at the top of the market: in CDAR/FlexMLS closed sales of Palm Springs single-family homes at $1.5M and up (October 24, 2024 to October 24, 2026), restoration-only remarks sold at $915 a square foot across 12 sales against $778 across 141 remodel-only sales. Taken together, the data does not show a clean restoration premium either way.
The inspection list
These are the five I insist on, and I tell buyers to budget for them before the offer, not after:
- Roof membrane. Low-slope roofs need a specialist. A general inspector looking from a ladder is not enough.
- Original electrical. Panels and wiring from the era can be undersized for a modern kitchen and a pool, let alone an EV charger.
- Single-pane glass. Beautiful, hot, and expensive to replace well. If the house is designated, replacement may need city review.
- Slab plumbing. Many of these houses have plumbing in or under the slab. Scope the drain lines.
- Pool. Equipment, surface, and leaks. A pool inspection is cheap next to a pool rebuild.
Designation, Mills Act, and HSPB timing
Palm Springs designates historic resources by City Council resolution, and Class 1 and Class 2 resources can be eligible for Mills Act contracts. Trust land is excluded from those classes under the Municipal Code, which matters in tracts with leased lots. The full rules are in my architectural homes guide.
Timing matters. If you plan exterior changes to a designated house, expect review by the city's Historic Site Preservation Board before work starts. Build that into your renovation calendar, and do not promise a contractor a start date until the city has weighed in.
Modernism Week and seasonality for sellers
Modernism Week 2027 runs February 11 to 21, 2027, with tickets on sale November 1, 2026 at noon PST, per modernismweek.com. The smaller October edition runs October 14 to 17, 2027. If you are selling a mid-century house, February is when the most design-minded buyers are physically in town. I would want the house listed, photographed, and ready before the festival starts, not launched in the middle of it.
My take
The tract I think is mispriced is Twin Palms. Over the last 12 months it sold at a median $873 a square foot, against $1,082 in Vista Las Palmas and $1,003 in Old Las Palmas, for houses of the same era with the same kind of pedigree. Its 24-month figure was $792, so the gap is closing, not widening. If you want a real mid-century house in a named tract and cannot stretch to Las Palmas, that is where I would look first.
I used to say Vista Las Palmas was slow. It is not: 34 median days in the last year. I also used to say restoring beats remodeling. My numbers no longer support that as a rule, so I will not sell it to you as one. What I will say is narrower. A remodel that removes the posts, glass, and roofline takes away the reason a mid-century buyer is in the room, and the data cannot measure that. Restore what defines the house, then update the systems. And in Indian Canyons, most of what trades is on leased land. Underwrite the lease, then decide.
More: Palm Springs, Vista Las Palmas, Indian Canyons.
FAQ
Which Palm Springs neighborhoods have the most mid-century homes?
Are mid-century homes in Palm Springs on leased land?
What inspections does a Palm Springs mid-century home need?
When is the best time to sell a mid-century home in Palm Springs?
Can I renovate a historic mid-century home?
Data note
CDAR/FlexMLS closed sales, Palm Springs single-family, searched by MLS Subdivision (Racquet Club East, Indian Canyons, Old Las Palmas, Vista Las Palmas, Twin Palms including one "18 at Twin Palms" sale, Sunmor): 194 sales closed October 25, 2024 through October 23, 2026; last 12 months n=96, closed October 25, 2025 through October 23, 2026. Citywide baseline: all Palm Springs single-family closed sales, October 24, 2024 through October 23, 2026, n=1,411; last 12 months n=727. Tenure inferred from the Land Lease fields. Restored vs remodeled is a keyword screen of public Marketing Remarks only. Method: medians computed in pandas from raw rows of CDAR/FlexMLS closed sales (export pulled October 24, 2026). $/sq ft is closed price divided by MLS approximate square footage. Days on market is the median of the MLS field, including any zero-day records.
Norman Williams, Compass. DRE 02051057.