Ralston, Nebraska.
Typical home $265,057 (+3.7% in a year), asking rent $1,389 . Omaha-Council Bluffs, NE-IA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$766 (+122%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $9,434 +4%
- $255,623$265,057 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $56,694 +27%
- $208,363$265,057 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.
- Ralston$1,391
- Nebraska$1,461
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 14 years.
Typical home values in Ralston, NE rose 3.7% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Ralston, Douglas County, Nebraska
Ralston is a city of 6,494 people in Douglas County. Half its households earn more than $69,403 a year and half less, against $80,391 across Douglas County; 4% of its people live below the poverty line. 63% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 37% are rented. Unemployment in Douglas County was 3.0% in August 2026, and the county had 0.3% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then restaurants and hotels.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Ralston is a small city of its own within the Omaha area, and its residents tend to be somewhat younger than in many towns. Incomes run below the county's, and most homes are lived in by their owners. Winters are cold and snowy, with January the coldest month, and summers are warm, with July the warmest. Rain and melted snow add up to a fair amount through the year.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, in restaurants, hotels and entertainment, in shops, and in professional and business services. Among the larger workplaces in Ralston are Asplundh Tree Expert, which provides arborist services, the Omaha Ralston mail and parcel delivery facility, and Sadler Electric. A typical commute is a modest one, and a small share of people work from home.
Things to do. Fun-Plex, an amusement park, is in or beside town, and Pipal Park, a garden, is just as close. A short drive away are Joslyn Art Museum, an art museum, and Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium, one of the best known zoos in the country.
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- 2,872households
- 27%of adults have a degree
- 4%below the poverty line
- 20 mintypical commute
- 10%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Douglas County had 341,754 jobs in 2025, 0.3% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 32° and lows near 14°; warmest in July, with highs near 86° and lows near 66°. About 36 inches of snow and 33 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Gretna 4NE weather station, 8 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Ralston
- Asplundh Tree Expert LLC RegionArborist services371
- Omaha RalstonMail and parcel delivery46
- Sadler ElectricFooting and foundation concrete contractors46
- Stephanie Moss AcademyTwo-year college37
- The Rhino GroupMedical furniture merchant wholesalers27
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 4 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 490 people in all. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24). 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
- HailRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
- Ice stormsRelatively moderate
- Heat wavesRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Ralston’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively low. 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 Douglas County and the Omaha-Council Bluffs, NE-IA metro.
Ralston home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Ralston$265,057
- 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.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Ralston16
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Ralston8
Zip codes with a Ralston address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Ralston — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zillow publishes no zip-level series with this city on the address.