Bismarck, North Dakota.
Typical home $378,242 (+5.3% in a year), asking rent $1,242 (+3.0%). Bismarck, ND metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$989 (+99%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $19,158 +5%
- $359,084$378,242 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $78,709 +26%
- $299,533$378,242 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.
- Bismarck$1,985
- North Dakota$1,526
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 15 years.
Typical home values in Bismarck, ND rose 5.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Bismarck, ND rose 3.0% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Bismarck runs $1,427/mo more than renting one — the widest that gap has been in this data.
That is $2,669 a month against $1,242 rent: a $1,985 mortgage payment, plus $279 property tax and $405 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Bismarck
The owning line is the typical home's monthly payment at that month's rate, plus property tax and insurance & upkeep; the renting line is the typical asking rent; the grey line is the mortgage payment on its own. Same homes, same months, both ways of paying for a roof.
- Owning all in$2,669
- Renting$1,242
- Mortgage only$1,985
Property tax · $279/mo 0.88% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Burleigh County, ND
Insurance & upkeep · $405/mo insurance, maintenance and repairs together, from the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey — the national figure for mortgaged homeowners, scaled to this market's home value. BLS publishes the three bundled and they cannot be split.
Both are priced off the same month's home value, so they rise with the market. Neither is a quote — a specific home's bill depends on its assessment, its age and its insurer.
Living in Bismarck, Burleigh County, North Dakota
Bismarck is a city of 73,622 people in Burleigh County. Half its households earn more than $78,387 a year and half less, against $86,851 across Burleigh County; 9% of its people live below the poverty line. 66% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 34% are rented. Unemployment in Bismarck was 2.0% in August 2026, and Burleigh County had 0.6% more 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. Bismarck is a city where most homes are lived in by their owners, and incomes run a little below those across Burleigh County. The population is of a middle age, and a four-year degree is held by a fair share of adults. Winters are cold, with January the coldest month, while July brings warm days, and rain and melted snow add up to a modest amount over the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with shops, government, and professional and business services also employing a good number. The largest workplaces in town include Sanford Bismarck, Bismarck 1 Schools and Doosan Bobcat Bismarck. Unemployment is low and has eased a little over the past year, and most people have a short trip to work.
Things to do. Dakota Zoo and the Bismarck Air Museum are both in or beside town, and the Bismarck Civic Auditorium hosts performances there too. A short drive away, Fort Abraham Lincoln is a protected area with a history that draws visitors, and General Sibley Park offers green space close to home.
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- 33,130households
- 39%of adults have a degree
- 9%below the poverty line
- 16 mintypical commute
- 8%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Burleigh County had 58,393 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 82° and lows near 58°. About 20 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Bismarck Nnw weather station, 2 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Bismarck
- Sanford BismarckGeneral hospital2,815FTE
- Bismarck 1 SchoolsSchool district1,945FTE
- Doosan Bobcat BismarckManufacturing1,190
- St Alexius Medical CenterGeneral hospital844FTE
- Bismarck State CollegeUniversity or college636
- Missouri Slope Lutheran Care Center - WashingtonNursing homes432
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters403
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters382
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 80 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 12,875 people in all. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023), school districts from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24) and colleges from IPEDS (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
- Winter weatherVery high
- HailVery high
- Cold wavesVery high
- Ice stormsVery high
- TornadoesRelatively high
- Strong windrelatively high in parts of BismarckRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Bismarck’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 Burleigh County and the Bismarck, ND metro.
Bismarck home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Bismarck$378,242
- North Dakota$290,657
- United States$366,157
Levy by levy, and a check of one home’s own bill, the site covers Ohio’s property tax.
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Bismarck listings, and the typical home goes pending in 16 days — the market is roughly in balance.
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
Share of listings with a price cut
The early-warning dial: sellers cut when buyers stop reaching. Rising cuts cool a market months before prices notice.
- Bismarck29.17%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Bismarck16
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Bismarck271
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Bismarck97
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Bismarck$346,307
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Bismarck98.94%
Zip codes with a Bismarck address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Bismarck — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Bismarck
| Zip activate to sort by Zip | Place activate to sort by Place | Population sorted descending, activate to sort ascending | Rent activate to sort by Rent | Home value activate to sort by Home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 58503 | Bismarck | 37,683 | $1,417 | $460,853 |
| 58504 | Bismarck | 30,212 | $1,399 | $357,259 |
| 58501 | Bismarck | 29,405 | $999 | $305,750 |