Armstrong, Iowa.
Typical home $165,577 (+5.7% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$463 (+114%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $8,916 +6%
- $156,661$165,577 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $41,778 +34%
- $123,800$165,577 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.
- Armstrong$869
- Iowa$1,242
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 12 years.
Typical home values in Armstrong, IA rose 5.7% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Armstrong, Emmet County, Iowa
Armstrong is a city of 875 people in Emmet County. Half its households earn more than $58,250 a year and half less, against $63,730 across Emmet County; 5% of its people live below the poverty line. 82% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 18% are rented. Unemployment in Emmet County was 3.9% in August 2026, and the county had 0.6% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then manufacturing.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Armstrong is a small city in Emmet County, Iowa, where most homes are lived in by their owners and a typical household earns somewhat less than across the county as a whole. Few residents hold a four-year degree, and few fall below the poverty line. Winters are cold and snowy, with January the coldest month, while July brings warm summer days and a fair amount of rain and melted snow arrives over the year.
Work. Residents work mainly in schools, hospitals and social care, with manufacturing, the building trades and shops also employing many. Among the largest workplaces in Armstrong are Valley Vue Care Center, the North Union Comm School District and Art's Way Manufacturing Co, which makes farm tractors and attachments. Commutes are short, and almost no one works from home.
Things to do. Okamanpeedan Lake is a short drive away and is the nearest spot for time by the water. Farther out, a longer drive reaches Fort Defiance State Park, a protected area, and Union Slough National Wildlife Refuge, another protected area. The Blue Earth River, also a longer drive away, adds a river setting to the mix of lakes and parkland around the town.
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- 342households
- 18%of adults have a degree
- 5%below the poverty line
- 16 mintypical commute
- 1%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Emmet County had 3,306 jobs in 2025, 0.6% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 22° and lows near 4°; warmest in July, with highs near 81° and lows near 60°. About 40 inches of snow and 33 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Swea City 5N weather station, 10 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Armstrong
- Valley Vue Care CenterSkilled nursing facilities71
- North Union Comm School DistrictSchool district69FTE
- Art's Way Manufacturing CoTractors and attachments, farm-type, manufacturing67
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 2 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 138 people in all. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24); 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
- Cold wavesVery high
- DroughtRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
- HailRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- LightningRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Armstrong’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 Emmet County.
Armstrong home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Armstrong$165,577
- Iowa$236,623
- 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.
- Armstrong8
Zip codes with a Armstrong address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Armstrong — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.