Preston, Minnesota.
Typical home $262,972 (+4.5% in a year). Rochester, MN metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$716 (+108%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $11,375 +5%
- $251,597$262,972 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $47,477 +22%
- $215,495$262,972 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.
- Preston$1,380
- Minnesota$1,831
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 17 years.
Typical home values in Preston, MN rose 4.5% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Preston, Fillmore County, Minnesota
Preston is a city of 1,322 people in Fillmore County. Half its households earn more than $63,984 a year and half less, against $77,512 across Fillmore County; 9% of its people live below the poverty line. 74% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 26% are rented. Unemployment in Fillmore County was 3.9% in August 2026, and the county had 1.0% fewer 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Preston is a small city in Fillmore County, a place where most homes are lived in by their owners. Household incomes run below the county's, and typical home values sit well within reach of what many families earn. Winters are cold and snowy, with January the coldest month, and summers are warm in July, with a fair amount of rain and melted snow across the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with manufacturing, professional and business services, and the building trades also employing a good number. Among the largest workplaces in Preston are Fillmore Central Schools, POET Biorefining - Preston and the City of Preston. Unemployment across the county has risen a little over the past year, and the county has fewer jobs than it did the year before. Commutes are fairly short, and some residents work from home.
Things to do. Preston Overlook is a tourist attraction in or beside town, and Camp Creek, a river, also runs in or beside town. A short drive away is Forestville/Mystery Cave State Park, a protected area. Farther afield, Niagara Cave is a tourist attraction a longer drive away.
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- 603households
- 27%of adults have a degree
- 9%below the poverty line
- 24 mintypical commute
- 12%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Fillmore County had 6,170 jobs in 2025, 1.0% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 24° and lows near 4°; warmest in July, with highs near 81° and lows near 58°. About 42 inches of snow and 37 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Preston weather station, under a mile away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Preston
- Fillmore Central SchoolsSchool district104FTE
- POET Biorefining - PrestonEthyl alcohol, nonpotable, manufacturing44
- City of PrestonHuman rights commissions, government35
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 2 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 79 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
- Inland floodingVery high
- Cold wavesRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
- LandslidesRelatively moderate
- HailRelatively moderate
- Strong windRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Preston’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 Fillmore County and the Rochester, MN metro.
Preston home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Preston$262,972
- Minnesota$348,778
- United States$366,157
Levy by levy, and a check of one home’s own bill, the site covers Ohio’s property tax.
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.
- Preston10
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
Not enough data to draw this yet.
Zip codes with a Preston address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Preston — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.