Buffalo, NY
Buffalo merits investigation for income-oriented buyers who can underwrite household outflows and flood exposure: the median value is $294,992, median asking rent is $1,461, and gross yield is 5.94%.
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.
Buffalo merits investigation for income-oriented buyers who can underwrite household outflows and flood exposure: the median value is $294,992, median asking rent is $1,461, and gross yield is 5.94%. Investors requiring positive net migration should avoid it.
Opportunity is constrained by mixed demand signals. CES employment grew 0.64% year over year, while asking rent rose 3.24% and home values rose 4.67%. Listings were tight at 2.6 months of supply and a 12-day median market time. For a buyer, that means competition for available homes despite employment growth trailing both housing measures.
Main risks sit outside the listing market: net migration was -2,789 households, and outbound movers had an average income $9,104 above inbound movers, calculated from the reported averages. Inland flood is the dominant hazard, with a 0.1209% annual building-value loss ratio. Buyers should treat quick sales as evidence of tight supply, not proof of expanding demand.
Frequently Asked Investor Questions
What are the basic purchase and rent economics?
How tight is the resale market?
What do tax filings show about migration and mover incomes?
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 Buffalo 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.
Rents versus prices, indexed to 2019
Both series start at 100. The gap between the lines is the investment case, and which line is closing it tells you what kind of market this is.
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 | 72 | 30% | 21.60 |
| Rent trend | 49 | 25% | 12.25 |
| Affordability | 52 | 15% | 7.80 |
| Supply pressure | 88 | 15% | 13.20 |
| Climate risk | 68 | 15% | 10.20 |
| Published score | 65 | ||
CES employment grew 0.64% year over year -> the recorded job base is expanding, but more slowly than rent and home values.
Asking rent rose 3.24% year over year -> the leasing benchmark is rising, although persistence is not published.
Median asking rent consumes 24.27% of median income and median value is 4.08 times income -> buyer and tenant affordability need separate underwriting.
Supply is 2.6 months and median market time is 12 days -> buyers face a tight, fast-moving resale market.
Inland flood is the dominant hazard and the annual loss ratio is 0.1209% -> property-level water exposure needs scrutiny.
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
- Net household migration was -2,789, with 14,198 households moving out and 11,409 moving in.
- CES employment grew 0.64% year over year, trailing rent and home-value growth.
- Inland flood is the dominant hazard, and the annual building-value loss ratio is 0.1209%.
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.
Metros that behave like Buffalo
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Buffalo, NY (Target) | 65 | $295k | $1,461 | 5.9% | ▲ 0.6% |
| Rochester, NY | 67 | $291k | $1,580 | 6.5% | ▲ 0.4% |
| Knoxville, TN | 42 | $370k | $1,756 | 5.7% | ▲ 0.9% |
| Tulsa, OK | 50 | $256k | $1,361 | 6.4% | ▲ 0.1% |
| Birmingham, AL | 39 | $264k | $1,462 | 6.7% | ▲ 0.2% |
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 |