Americus, Kansas.
Typical home $207,680 (+5.2% in a year). Emporia, KS metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$587 (+117%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $10,193 +5%
- $197,487$207,680 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $44,838 +28%
- $162,842$207,680 since Sep 2021
Monthly payment to buy the typical home
Home value × that month's 30-year mortgage rate, 20% down, principal and interest. This is the line households feel: prices and rates compound each other.
- Americus$1,090
- Kansas$1,291
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 14 years.
Typical home values in Americus, KS rose 5.2% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Americus, Lyon County, Kansas
Americus is a city of 776 people in Lyon County. Half its households earn more than $73,542 a year and half less, against $59,912 across Lyon County; 11% of its people live below the poverty line. 80% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 20% are rented. Unemployment in Lyon County was 5.2% in August 2026, and the county had 4.5% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then shops.
Written by AI Claude Sonnet 5.5 wrote this on 23 October 2026 from the figures here, a list of nearby places and what it knows. It can be wrong or out of date.
What it’s like
The place. Americus is a very small city in the Kansas Flint Hills, where nearly everyone knows one another and most homes are lived in by their owners. Household incomes run higher than across Lyon County, and homes here cost less than a typical home in much of the country. Winters are cold and summers are hot, with a fair amount of rain and melted snow through the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, in shops, or in manufacturing and professional services. Across Lyon County, some of the largest workplaces are Simmons Foods, Emporia Schools and Emporia State University. Jobs in the county have been slipping lately, and unemployment there is a little lower than it was a year ago.
Things to do. A short drive away, the National Teachers Hall of Fame is a museum honoring teachers, and the David Traylor Zoo of Emporia makes an easy outing. For open country, Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve is a protected area a longer drive away, and Melvern Lake, a reservoir, is also a longer drive off.
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- 307households
- 28%of adults have a degree
- 11%below the poverty line
- 22 mintypical commute
- 5%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Lyon County had 14,666 jobs in 2025, 4.5% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 39° and lows near 18°; warmest in July, with highs near 88° and lows near 67°. About 36 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Emporia Northwest weather station, 6 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Lyon County
- Simmons Foods1,007
- Emporia SchoolsSchool district769FTE
- Hostess Brand LLC - EmporiaCommercial bakeries675
- Emporia State UniversityUniversity or college654
- Texas Family InitiativeAdoption services, child568
- Simmons Foods565
- Newman Regional HealthCritical access hospital395FTE
- TFI Family ServicesChild welfare services363
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 29 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 5,247 people in all across the county; Americus has one of its own. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24), colleges from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24) and hospitals from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023); FTE marks full-time equivalent staff. Not listed: many offices and banks, which need not report to OSHA; military bases, whose staff OPM withholds; and, in about half the states, city and county governments.
Natural hazards
- Ice stormsVery high
- Winter weatherVery high
- WildfireRelatively high
- LightningRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Americus’ census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively moderate. It is meant for planning, not a substitute for a local risk assessment or a flood map: FEMA’s index.
From the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 census and its American Community Survey (2020–2024 five-year estimates), and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A survey, so each figure has a margin of error, and figures it is not sure of are left out. More on Lyon County and the Emporia, KS metro.
Americus home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Americus$207,680
- Kansas$246,055
- United States$366,157
When this market ran hot
Each cell is that month's year-on-year home-value growth. Read left to right, top row is the latest year — the 2021–22 band is the boom.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
Not enough data to draw this yet.
Zip codes with a Americus address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Americus — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.