Rental market · Amherst Town, MA · Incorporated city
Amherst Town, MA: average rent, home values, and rental yield
New England · Population 38,182
Why this market does or does not qualify
No Overall City Market Score rank is published. The standardized Buy & Hold screen cannot produce a complete result for this city.
Supported strengths
The city does not have enough measured inputs for two supported score strengths.
Measured weakness
No category weakness can be ranked without a complete score.
Missing screen inputs: City Market Score, investor-entry price estimate. Primary evidenced risk: No scored factor is available to identify a measured market risk.
Data caveat: no missing input is treated as a zero cost. Bring an actual property’s price, rent, taxes, condition, and insurance quote to the calculator.
Why there is no grade
The model refuses to rank a market that is missing one of its core inputs rather than score that input as neutral or fill it in from somewhere else. It also declines to score a market when too few of its inputs are directly measured rather than imputed. Here 5 of the nine inputs that test looks at were measured, below the minimum it requires, so the market was held out before scoring began. 7 of the 13 scored factors were measured, and every one of them is shown below with its source and its as-of date.
This is a statement about the data, not about the market. A place with no published rank is not a place we have judged badly.
Price & rent history
Home value: no Zillow ZHVI series - Zillow does not cover this city (Census-only). Nothing plotted rather than estimated.
Asking rent: no Zillow ZORI series - Zillow does not cover this city (Census-only). Nothing plotted rather than estimated.
ZIP markets in Amherst Town
2 Census ZIP Codes (ZCTAs) officially overlap Amherst Town by land area · 1 data-eligible for subscores. Overlap is Census land-area share, not a population or address share. Each ZIP Code's overall Rental Investor ZIP Score, grade and canonical national rank are shown below (the two component signals, affordability and rental market, are separate percentiles). There is no city-scoped ZIP rank: city overlap isn't a ranking universe, so only the national rank is shown. These ZIP rankings sit in the ZIP universe only, never mixed with, and not directly comparable to, Amherst Town's city ranking. Vintage: the Key metric column below is Census ACS 2020–2024 (5-year), the same survey release as the figures used above for Amherst Town itself; a city and a ZIP Code are different geographies, so the same measure can still show a different number at each level.
2 of 2 overlapping ZIP Code areas, scoredgrade, overall Rental Investor ZIP Score and national rank for each, on a separate model from this page's city scoreShow table
| ZIP Code | Overallgrade · natl rank | Tier · overlap | Affordabilitysignal · natl rank | Rental marketsignal · natl rank | Key metric |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01002Amherst Town | D 41#13,078 nat | RankedPrimary | 18#19,629 of 20,132 · bottom 3% | 57#6,757 of 20,132 · top 34% | 4.2%Survey yield |
| 01003Amherst Town | — | ProfilePrimary | — | — | $3k/moMedian rent |
Every factor, shown
The Overall score blends three category scores built from thirteen measured factors: Cash Flow (35%), Growth (35%), and Stability (30%). The table shows every factor; the tag on each percentile marks which category a scored factor feeds. Untagged factors are shown for context but not scored. Every percentile also carries the band it falls in - top 10%, top quartile, above or below the national median, bottom quartile, bottom 10% - so a bare ordinal still reads as a position; the band restates that percentile and adds nothing to it. Every value carries its source and as-of date. How the score works.
| Factor | Value | National percentile | Source · as-of | What it means |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Expense-adjusted yield fallback | 4.1% | - | Census ACS · ACS 5-yr 2020-2024 | Annual rent divided by price, net of a modeled vacancy, tax, capex, and management allowance: the core of the Cash Flow category and what the score is actually computed from. The unadjusted gross yield is shown elsewhere on this page. |
| Price to income fallback | 7.2x | - | Census ACS · ACS 5-yr 2020-2024 | Home price over local median income. Lower is cheaper relative to what people earn. Part of the Cash Flow category. |
| Population growth | 8.0%/yr | - | Census PEP · Census PEP 2020→2025 (vintage 2025) | Census population trend for the place, capped at 4.5%/yr before scoring (diminishing returns above that rate): the heaviest factor in the Growth category. |
| Job growth | -0.2%/yr | - | BLS LAUS (county) · BLS LAUS county annual 2019→2025 (pre-COVID anchor; 2025 is an 11-month average) + BLS LAUS county annual 2015→2025 | County employment trend, capped at 4.0%/yr before scoring (diminishing returns above that rate). A Growth-category factor. |
| Income growth | not measured | - | derived | Local median-income trend. A Growth-category factor. |
| Rent growth | not measured | - | derived | A 40/60 blend of 3-year and 10-year rent trend (the model's own weighting). A Growth-category factor. |
| Home-value growth | not measured | - | derived | A 40/60 blend of 3-year and 10-year price trend (the model's own weighting). A small Growth-category factor. |
| Unemployment | 4.2% | - | BLS LAUS (county) · BLS LAUS county annual 2025 (11-month average) | County unemployment rate. Lower is steadier, a Stability-category factor. |
| Rental vacancy | 8.2% | - | Census ACS B25004 · ACS 5-yr 2020-2024 | Share of rentals empty. Lower means more pricing power. A Stability-category factor. |
| Property tax rate | 1.8% | - | Census ACS B25103/B25077 · ACS 5-yr 2020-2024 | Median tax over median value. A direct drag on cash flow, scored in the Stability category as carrying-cost burden. |
| Months of supply | not measured | - | derived | Listings over sales pace. Under about 4 is a seller market, over 6 a buyer market. A Stability-category factor. |
| Days on market | not measured | - | derived | How fast homes sell. Lower means more liquidity and an easier exit. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Sale-to-list ratio | not measured | - | derived | Sale price over asking. Above 100% means homes clear over ask. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Net domestic migration | -4.3/1k | - | Census PEP (county) · PEP vintage 2025 | Net people moving in or out of the county, per 1,000 residents. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Building permits | 9.4/1k | - | Census BPS (county) · BPS 2025 | New-construction permits per 1,000 homes. More means more supply coming. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Rent burden | 41% | - | Census ACS B25071 · ACS 5-yr 2020-2024 | Median rent as a share of income. Higher means less headroom for increases. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Median year built | 1975 | - | Census ACS B25035 · ACS 5-yr 2020-2024 | Age of the housing stock. Older stock carries more capex. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Max drawdown | not measured | - | derived | Worst peak-to-trough home-value decline on record. Shown for context, not scored. |
| Violent crime | not reported | - | FBI CDE | No agency reported this place to the FBI. We never impute a crime number; where it is missing, the Stability category renormalizes over its remaining factors. |
- † Job growth and unemployment are county-level (BLS LAUS, county FIPS 25015); large multi-county cities inherit their dominant county’s figures.
- Yield uses ACS median gross rent and home value (Census survey data, 2020–2024 average) because Zillow does not cover this city - not directly comparable to Zillow-based yields.
- Data flag: cashYield: ACS fallback (no Zillow rent+value).
- Data flag: rentGrowth: missing.
- Data flag: appreciation: missing.
- Data flag: popGrowth: no 2015 PEP estimate - recent window only.
- Data flag: incomeGrowth: missing.
Where to go next from Amherst Town
Every link below is this market's own data taken one step further: its neighbours in the ranking, the same numbers side by side, or the same numbers in a calculator you can change.
Nearby in the Massachusetts rankings, and national look-alikes
- Randolph Town, MAGrade B · score 51/100 · yield 5.1% · $496,400 · #1,830 national
- Bridgewater Town, MAGrade B · score 50/100 · yield 4.7% · $533,100 · #1,900 national
- Southbridge Town, MAGrade C · score 48/100 · yield 5.1% · $294,800 · #2,252 national
- Lawrence, MAGrade C · score 48/100 · yield 5.6% · $513,746 · #2,336 nationalZillow ZHVI $95k (2000) to $514k (2026), +439%
Compare Amherst Town head to head
- Amherst Town vs Randolph TownThe pre-filled matchup: nearest in-state rank and closest national grade.
- Amherst Town vs Bridgewater Town, MAGrade B · yield 4.7%
- Pick your own opponentAny of the 5,233 tracked cities.
Underwrite an Amherst Town deal
- Cap rateOpens on Amherst Town's own entry price and rent. Change either one.
- Cash flow & DSCRMonthly cash flow and DSCR, prefilled with this market's numbers.
- Mortgage paymentP&I on Amherst Town's entry price at the assumptions shown above.
- All marketsCompare Amherst Town against 4,812 ranked cities.
- Massachusetts ZIP CodesEvery Massachusetts ZIP Code area (Census ZCTAs), scored separately from the city rankings.
- Ranked listsYield, affordability, growth, stability, price band, or whether rent covers the mortgage.
For learning, not advice. A market screen from public data - not a forecast, not underwriting, not a recommendation to buy anywhere.