Development scorecard · October 2026

What's being built in Rancho Cordova in 2026, what's only on paper, and what it does to your house

No city in Sacramento County has more housing in the pipeline than Rancho Cordova: 12,189 homes entitled in Rio del Oro alone, another 7,130 proposed at Westborough, and seven subdivisions pouring foundations this fall. Most of it will take until the 2050s. Here is the project-by-project scorecard with status, source, and the honest read on what each one means if you own a house here.

Ray Okamura · updated October 13, 2026 · 11 min read

Why the pipeline matters more here than anywhere else

In most Sacramento suburbs the question for a homeowner is "what are they building near me?" In Rancho Cordova it is "how fast?" The city has already entitled more homes than it can absorb in a generation, and the pace at which builders pull permits is the single biggest influence on resale prices south of Douglas Road. I spent two decades on the infrastructure side of projects like these. I read a status list the way an engineer does: what has grading equipment on it, not what has a rendering. Renderings are cheap.

The city's major-projects page is the primary source for the housing items below and was current in October 2026. Everything else is sourced inline.

Housing: the big three plans

Rio del Oro Specific Plan

Status: grading in progress; production homes under construction on parcels 66 and 67.

Rio del Oro is the largest development in the city's history: 3,800 acres northeast of Sunrise Boulevard and Douglas Road, entitled for 12,189 dwelling units across a range of types and prices, with a buildout the entitlement documents put at 25 to 30 years in five phases. The developers are Gencorp Realty Investments (the Aerojet real-estate arm) and Elliott Homes. Ground broke in 2020 and the first phase along White Rock Road produced model homes in 2021 and 2022. In October 2026, two parcels of production homes are under construction and the next phase is being graded. A separate industrial project, the Rio del Oro Business Park by VanTrust, is under way on the commercial side.

Engineer's read: Rio del Oro is the ceiling on every resale in 95742 for the next thirty years. When Elliott is selling a new four-bedroom with a rate buy-down at $650,000, a 2014 Anatolia four-bedroom cannot ask $680,000. The useful metric to watch is the builder's closings per month, which the city tracks through permits; a trickle keeps resale values firm, a flood does not. An owner who cannot or will not price under the model home has one other door, which is a direct sale: a cash buyer that covers Rancho Cordova prices against condition and location, not against Elliott's incentive sheet.

Sunridge Specific Plan

Status: mostly built; four projects still delivering homes.

The Sunridge plan, adopted in the early 2000s, covers the land between Douglas Road, Rancho Cordova Parkway and Grant Line Road and is the reason Rancho Cordova grew 22 percent between the 2010 and 2020 censuses. The city's list shows the state of each piece:

If you own a house near this: Sunridge is the corridor's proof of concept. The completed projects (North Douglas, Grantline 208, Douglas 98, Anatolia IV, roughly 1,850 homes) are now resale inventory competing with the three still selling new, which is why price cuts are more common south of Douglas than in the old grid. When Montelena and Arista del Sol sell out, probably 2027 to 2028 at current pace, the corridor's resale market gets a breather until Rio del Oro's next phase opens.

The Ranch, SunCreek and The Preserve

Status: The Ranch and The Preserve under construction; SunCreek approved but mostly not started.

The Ranch, by K. Hovnanian east of Rancho Cordova Parkway, is 1,437 lots including an active-adult section, and is selling production homes now. The Preserve, Lennar's 439 lots north of the North Douglas subdivision, is also under construction. The SunCreek Specific Plan to the south is the next wave: Grantline 220 (Lennar, 910 units) is under construction, while Gilmartin/Trevor (950), Shalako (1,150) and Sierra Sunrise (1,046) have approved tentative maps and no vertical construction, and Callahan (553) has a submitted map listed as inactive.

What it does to your value: the active-adult product at The Ranch is a new buyer type for the city, and it pulls downsizers who would otherwise have gone to Lincoln or Roseville. SunCreek's 4,600 approved units are the second ceiling behind Rio del Oro; the approved-but-unbuilt status means they can start on a builder's timetable without another public hearing.

Housing: the Aerojet land

Westborough at Easton

Status: environmental review; specific plan not yet adopted.

Westborough is the city's share of the former Aerojet property along Highway 50. The November 2023 notice of preparation on CEQAnet describes 7,130 residential units, about 320 acres of commercial uses and three schools on roughly 1,548 acres. The Department of Toxic Substances Control commented on the notice because the land was carved out of the Superfund boundary; the EPA's site profile and the Water Board's cleanup page cover the conditions. Across the city line, Sacramento County approved the adjacent Easton Place and Glenborough plans in 2009 for 4,883 units and about 4 million square feet of office and commercial space; those have moved slowly.

The practical consequence: this is a 2030s story. Westborough will not deliver homes before the EIR is certified and the plan adopted, and nothing on the public record suggests that before 2027 or 2028. For the old grid it is the long-run upside: a new town center and employment district on the freeway side of the city, two miles from houses that currently price as "older Rancho Cordova."

The Waegell property

Status: concept; council discussion in 2024.

The council reviewed a development concept in July 2024 for about 1,334 acres at the city's southern edge, with 6,916 dwelling units and 3,634 jobs projected. There is no adopted plan. I list it because it is the last large private holding inside the city's sphere, and because 6,916 is not a small number.

Housing: affordable and supportive

Mather Veterans Village, Phase IV

Status: under construction; broke ground April 10, 2026; completion expected March 2028.

Mather Veterans Village, on the former base, is the region's first permanent supportive housing for homeless and disabled veterans, built by Mercy Housing California and Nation's Finest with the city and county. Phases I through III (2016 to 2021) provide 100 permanent units and 47 transitional beds. Phase IV adds 70 all-electric apartments for senior veterans, financed in part by $31.5 million in state Homekey+ money; the city's project page has the details, and a fifth phase is in early planning.

My take for owners: nothing measurable on price. It matters for the city's housing-element compliance, which keeps the state's "builder's remedy" off the table, and it reflects the veteran population that shapes the sub-$550,000 buyer pool.

Mills Crossing and the 210-unit solicitation

Status: Mills Crossing received council direction in June 2026; the 210-unit project is out for developer proposals due October 30, 2026.

Mills Crossing, near the Mather Field/Mills light-rail station, is a mixed project of roughly 140,000 square feet of community-commercial space with up to 120 homes, including affordable apartments and townhouse-style units; a construction tracker lists a late-2027 start, which I would treat as soft. Separately, the city is soliciting a developer for a 210-unit affordable rental community on city-owned land, with selection targeted for December 2026.

On resale prices: both are transit-adjacent infill in the older half of the city, which is exactly where new investment has been scarce. Neither competes with a single-family resale.

Roads and transit

Grant Line Road reconstruction (Capital SouthEast Connector, segment D2a)

Status: in design; $25 million federal RAISE grant awarded March 2026; reported completion 2035.

Grant Line Road is the eastern boundary of the growth corridor and still a two-lane county road for most of its length. The city's segment of the Capital SouthEast Connector, the 34-mile expressway from Interstate 5 in Elk Grove to Highway 50 in El Dorado Hills, is the 3.5 miles from White Rock Road to Chrysanthy Boulevard, widened to four lanes with a separated path. The local paper reported the full Grant Line expansion at $55 million, with the RAISE grant covering nearly half and completion between White Rock and Douglas by 2035.

If this is your street: on the east side of the corridor, Grant Line traffic is the complaint I hear most, and it will get worse before the widening is built because the subdivisions along it (Grantline 220, Douglas 103, The Preserve) are being occupied now. Houses backing onto the road should price for a decade of construction; houses a half mile in will benefit when it is done.

The Gold Line and a fifth station

Status: four stations operating; a fifth, at Horn Road, is shown as planned.

SacRT's Gold Line serves Mather Field/Mills, Zinfandel, Cordova Town Center and Sunrise, with trains to downtown Sacramento in about half an hour. SacRT ended its SmaRT Ride microtransit on January 1, 2025 in favor of SacRT Flex, and the city's Rancho CordoVan shuttle still runs between Zinfandel station and the business parks on weekday peaks. A planned Horn station appears in transit-agency planning documents with a late-decade opening I have not seen confirmed.

What it means in dollars: within a half mile of a station, especially Zinfandel and Cordova Town Center, transit is a real line item for buyers who work downtown. Beyond that it is a talking point.

Commercial and jobs

Rancho Cordova is unusual among Sacramento suburbs in having more jobs than workers: the city's economic development office counts about 3,200 businesses and 63,000 employees inside the city, in health plans and insurers, Aerojet Rocketdyne's headquarters and manufacturing, logistics, and state and county offices. The 2022 Census economic figures put health-care receipts in the city at $2.2 billion. Two newer pieces: the Barrel District, a cluster of breweries, distilleries and tasting rooms in the industrial blocks south of the freeway between Trade Center Drive and White Rock Road, has grown into a small destination over the past eight years; and the Rio del Oro Business Park is bringing industrial space to the east side with the housing.

For the owner wondering about it: the jobs base is why Rancho Cordova's sales held in a year when Elk Grove's fell. People who work in the city buy in the city when the payment math gets tight, and the payment math is very tight. See the fall 2026 market notes for the numbers.

Reading the scorecard as an owner

Put it together and you get a city with two housing markets on two clocks. South of Douglas, supply is abundant and will be for decades; resale prices there are set by builders and by rates, and the right move for a seller is to price under the new-build equivalent and move quickly. North of Douglas, supply is fixed and aging; prices there are set by condition and by what an FHA or VA appraiser will accept, and the right move is to settle the roof, the panel and the permit history before choosing a route.

For an old-grid house that needs more than paint, or a corridor house that has to beat the model home, Pacific Home Buyers' Rancho Cordova page will give you a written cash number in a day, and it belongs on the table next to an agent's net sheet before you commit either way. How to weigh the two is in selling a house in Rancho Cordova in 2026, and the band-by-band detail on what each neighborhood's inspector will find is in the neighborhoods guide.