Amherst, Nebraska.
Typical home $406,419 (+12.8% in a year). Kearney, NE metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,266 (+146%) since Feb 2021.
- 1 year
- Up $45,990 +13%
- $360,429$406,419 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $139,796 +52%
- $266,623$406,419 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.
- Amherst$2,133
- Nebraska$1,461
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 8 years.
Typical home values in Amherst, NE rose 12.8% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Amherst, Buffalo County, Nebraska
Amherst is a village of 201 people in Buffalo County. Half its households earn more than $69,125 a year and half less, against $75,911 across Buffalo County; 3% of its people live below the poverty line. Unemployment in Buffalo County was 2.5% in August 2026, and the county had 0.1% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most people in Buffalo County 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Amherst is a very small village in Buffalo County, Nebraska, where neighbors are likely to know one another. Household incomes run somewhat below the county's, and relatively few residents live below the poverty line. Typical home values are high for a place this size. Winters are cold, with January the coldest month and a fair amount of snow, while July brings real heat and the year as a whole is moderately wet.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, with others in shops, manufacturing, and restaurants, hotels and entertainment. The typical commute is a moderate drive, and only a small share of people work from home. Across Buffalo County, large employers include Baldwin Filters, the University of Nebraska at Kearney and Kearney Public Schools, and unemployment in the county has stayed low and steady over the past year.
Things to do. The best known place nearby is Fort Kearny, a fort a longer drive away. Rainwater Basin, a protected area, is also a longer drive away. The Museum of Nebraska Art is another museum within a longer drive, and a good choice for a quieter afternoon.
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- 3%below the poverty line
- 21 mintypical commute
- 5%work from home
What people in Buffalo County work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Buffalo County had 28,130 jobs in 2025, 0.1% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 36° and lows near 14°; warmest in July, with highs near 87° and lows near 63°. About 22 inches of snow and 26 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Kearney Northeast weather station, 16 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Buffalo County
- Baldwin FiltersOther motor vehicle parts manufacturing1,211
- University of Nebraska at KearneyUniversity or college939
- Kearney Public SchoolsSchool district782FTE
- The BuckleClothing stores, family695
- CHI Health Good SamaritanGeneral hospital677FTE
- AFGAnimal fats produced in slaughtering plants634
- Kearney Regional Medical CenterGeneral hospital570FTE
- LandMark ImplementAgricultural implements merchant wholesalers527
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 50 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 7,871 people in all across the county; Amherst has one of its own. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24), school districts from the Common Core of Data (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
- HailVery high
- Strong windVery high
- DroughtRelatively high
- LightningRelatively high
- Ice stormsRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Amherst’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively high. 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 Buffalo County and the Kearney, NE metro.
Amherst home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Amherst$406,419
- Nebraska$278,299
- 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.
Zip codes with a Amherst address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Amherst — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.