Vanderbilt, Michigan.
Typical home $206,987 (+6.4% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$651 (+150%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $12,474 +6%
- $194,513$206,987 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $47,631 +30%
- $159,355$206,987 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.
- Vanderbilt$1,086
- Michigan$1,384
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 13 years.
Typical home values in Vanderbilt, MI rose 6.4% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Vanderbilt, Otsego County, Michigan
Vanderbilt is a village of 498 people in Otsego County. Unemployment in Otsego County was 4.4% in August 2026, and the county had 1.4% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most people in Otsego 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Vanderbilt is a very small village in northern Michigan, the kind of place where residents are likely to know one another. Winters are long and cold, with heavy snowfall, and summers are mild and pleasant. Few adults here hold a four-year degree, and the typical home costs less than what many buyers would expect to pay elsewhere in the state.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, with shops, restaurants and hotels, and manufacturing also employing many people. Across Otsego County, some of the largest workplaces are Walmart, Gaylord Community Schools and Otsego Memorial Hospital. The county has lost a few jobs over the past year, and unemployment there is lower than it was a year earlier. Commutes are fairly short.
Things to do. Thumb Lake is a short drive away, and it is the nearest spot for time on the water. Farther afield, Otsego Lake is another lake within a longer drive, and Boyne Mountain is a ski area that suits the snowy winters. Burt Lake State Park, a protected area on a larger lake, is also a longer drive from the village.
Report a mistake
- 5%of adults have a degree
- 9%below the poverty line
- 20 mintypical commute
What people in Otsego County work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Otsego County had 10,549 jobs in 2025, 1.4% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 24° and lows near 8°; warmest in July, with highs near 77° and lows near 55°. About 140 inches of snow and 37 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Gaylord weather station, 8 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Otsego County
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters404
- Gaylord Community SchoolsSchool district338FTE
- Otsego Memorial HospitalGeneral hospital271FTE
- Treetops ResortHotels, resort, without casinos258
- MeijerRetail226
- Cooper Standard - GaylordRubber goods, mechanical, manufacturing199
- M&M Excavating CoOverpass construction163
- Menards"home centers"134
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 42 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 3,531 people in all across the county; Vanderbilt has two of its own. School districts come 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
- LightningRelatively high
- HailRelatively high
- Cold wavesRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Vanderbilt’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 Otsego County.
Vanderbilt home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Vanderbilt$206,987
- Michigan$263,760
- 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.
- Vanderbilt15
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
Not enough data to draw this yet.
Zip codes with a Vanderbilt address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Vanderbilt — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.