Albany, OR
Albany merits selective investigation by income-focused buyers willing to accept weak employment and inland-flood exposure; buyers who require strong growth signals should avoid it.
Why this market scores where it does
Written from the figures on this page and then checked against them: every number below had to appear in the source record or recompute from two that did, or the text was rewritten.
Albany merits selective investigation by income-focused buyers willing to accept weak employment and inland-flood exposure; buyers who require strong growth signals should avoid it. Median asking rent is $1,639 against a $414,303 median home value, for a 4.75% gross yield before expenses.
Opportunity lies in mixed but constructive housing signals: rent rose 1.21% while home values rose 0.35%, and net migration was positive at 587 households. At the same time, listings took 56 days to sell and 26.56% had price drops, giving buyers evidence of negotiating room rather than broad pricing strength.
Risk is concentrated in demand and ownership economics. CES jobs fell 1.39%, while the price-to-income ratio is 5.43 even though rent consumes 25.77% of median income. The dominant hazard is inland flood, and the published climate loss ratio is 0.002091 of building value per year. A deal should work on current rent and verified property-level flood costs, not appreciation assumptions.
Frequently Asked Investor Questions
Did migration improve both the household count and income mix?
What negotiating signals are present in the resale market?
How much investor buying is visible?
Investor Quick Takeaways
Computed from the current Zillow rent and home-value medians.
Zillow ZORI rent growth trend over trailing 12 months.
Originated investment purchase share (CFPB HMDA).
Annualized loss ratio evaluated for flood & hurricane risk.
Test the market, then test the deal
Keep Albany as the starting point or move into a more specific property and rent check.
The current market in eight signals
Fast-moving Redfin conditions sit beside the slower fundamentals so a buyer can separate today's negotiating climate from the long-run investment case.
What each component measures
Weights are published, not hidden, and the arithmetic is shown. Five components, each measured as a national percentile across all tracked metros.
| Signal | Score | Weight | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| Job growth | 8 | 30% | 2.40 |
| Rent trend | 20 | 25% | 5.00 |
| Affordability | 42 | 15% | 6.30 |
| Supply pressure | 68 | 15% | 10.20 |
| Climate risk | 21 | 15% | 3.15 |
| Published score | 27 | ||
CES employment fell 1.39% year over year -> underwrite tenant demand without assuming job growth.
Asking rent rose 1.21% year over year and gross yield is 4.75% -> test current income against all property expenses.
Rent equals 25.77% of median income while price is 5.43 times income -> renter affordability is less stretched than buyer affordability.
Permits totaled 242 and for-sale supply was 3.2 months -> assess new and resale competition separately rather than treating either figure as proof of a shortage.
Inland flood is the dominant hazard and the climate loss ratio is 0.002091 -> verify property-level flood exposure and insurance costs.
What this market costs and what it earns
Every derived ratio below recomputes from the same source record used by the article and score.
What is being built, and for whom
Permits are the 12-to-24 month early warning. The total matters less than the mix: apartments compete with a rental the day they open.
Demand, and the competition for it
Tax filings say how many households moved and what they earn; mortgage disclosures say how many local purchases went to someone who will not live there. Moves between counties inside this metro are netted out of both flow figures.
What would make this a bad buy
Generated from the same figures with the instruction to argue against the score, and published unedited. A page that only agrees with itself is an advertisement.
Three ways the case breaks
- Employment weakness could weigh on tenant demand because CES jobs fell 1.39% year over year.
- The 4.75% gross yield could leave a thin income cushion after expenses, which are not published.
- Inland-flood exposure could produce property-specific losses or insurance costs not captured by the metro-level climate loss ratio.
Move from the metro average to local evidence
County pages carry tax, migration, listing and hazard records. City pages appear only where direct city price, rent and Census evidence pass the publication gate.
No city in this metro has passed the current city evidence gate.
Metros that behave like Albany
Nearest neighbours on price level, income, yield and job growth — not on geography. Every market page gets a different peer set, which is the point.
| Metro | Score | Price | Rent | Yield | Job Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Albany, OR (Target) | 27 | $414k | $1,639 | 4.8% | ▼ 1.4% |
| Moses Lake, WA | 30 | $363k | $1,479 | 4.9% | ▼ 0.9% |
| Walla Walla, WA | 35 | $424k | $1,492 | 4.2% | ▼ 1.3% |
| Brainerd, MN | 43 | $369k | $1,237 | 4.0% | ▼ 1.5% |
| Oshkosh, WI | 46 | $308k | $1,169 | 4.6% | ▼ 0.9% |
Where every figure came from
“Checked nightly” means every source is re-pulled and re-verified each night. It does not mean every source moves nightly — the release column tells you how fresh each number can possibly be.
| Dataset Source | Method | Release Period | Pulled Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Census ACS 5-year — household income | direct | ACS 2024 5-year | 2026-07-26 |
| Census ACS 5-year — population | direct | ACS 2024 5-year | 2026-07-26 |
| BLS CES — payroll employment | direct | CES SM current | 2026-07-26 |
| BLS LAUS — resident employment | direct | LAUS current | 2026-07-26 |
| BLS QCEW — county employment and wages | direct | annual county employment and wages 2025 vs 2024 | 2026-07-31 |
| OMB/BLS delineation — metro geography | direct | OMB July 2023 delineation | 2026-07-30 |
| Census Building Permits Survey — permitted units | direct | BPS through 2026 | 2026-07-26 |
| Census ACS 5-year — city population, households and housing | direct | ACS 2024 5-year | 2026-07-29 |
| Census ACS 5-year — county housing value, tenure and stock | direct | ACS 2024 5-year | 2026-07-30 |
| Census ACS 5-year — cities and communities | direct | ACS 2024 5-year | 2026-07-30 |
| FEMA National Risk Index — hazard loss ratios | modelled | NRI counties (FEMA ArcGIS) | 2026-07-26 |
| FHFA House Price Index — annual county appreciation | direct | annual county HPI 2025 | 2026-07-28 |
| HMDA / CFPB — purchases by occupancy type | direct | HMDA 2024 purchase originations | 2026-07-26 |
| HUD Fair Market Rents — Section 8 standard | direct | FY2026 FMR | 2026-07-26 |
| HUD USPS crosswalk and Small Area FMRs — ZIP rent fallback | direct | ZIP-CBSA 2025Q4 + SAFMR FY2026 | 2026-07-26 |
| IRS SOI — county migration and mover income | direct | SOI migration 2022-2023 | 2026-07-26 |
| Freddie Mac PMMS — mortgage rates | direct | week of 2026-07-23 | 2026-07-27 |
| Census ACS 5-year — effective property tax | direct | ACS 2024 5-year | 2026-07-27 |
| Realtor.com Economic Research — county listing inventory | direct | county inventory 2026-06 | 2026-07-28 |
| Redfin Data Center — inventory, days on market, and price cuts | direct | metro tracker through 2026-05-01 | 2026-07-26 |
| Zillow ZHVI and ZORI — county values and rents | direct | county ZHVI/ZORI 2026-06 | 2026-07-26 |
| Zillow ZHVI — metro home values | direct | Metro_zhvi_uc_sfrcondo_tier_0.33_0.67_sm_sa_month.csv | 2026-07-26 |
| Zillow ZHVI — city home values | direct | zillow_zhvi_city.csv | 2026-07-29 |
| Zillow ZORI — metro market rents | direct | Metro_zori_uc_sfrcondomfr_sm_sa_month.csv | 2026-07-26 |
| Zillow ZORI — city market rents | direct | zillow_zori_city.csv | 2026-07-29 |
| Zillow ZORI — ZIP market rents | direct | ZORI ZIP 2026-06 | 2026-07-26 |