Market screen · county data · updated October 18, 2026
Worcester, MA: a typical house comes in at 0.73x; houses under about $251,500 clear 1.20x
At the HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent ($2,043 a month), a house at the area's typical value ($423,700) has a full monthly payment of $2,787: principal and interest on a 75% loan at 7.5% over 30 years, plus property tax and insurance. The rent covers 0.73x of it. At the 3-bedroom figure ($2,560) it would be 0.92x. Run the house you are looking at on its own rent.
The numbers
Typical home value
$423,700
County medians weighted by households (Census ACS).
Rent: HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent
$2,043
A government floor, not a house rent.
Rent: HUD 3-bedroom Fair Market Rent
$2,560
The high end of the range.
Payment that clears 1.20x
$1,703
Rent ÷ 1.20, taxes and insurance included.
Price that clears 1.20x
$251,500
At this rent, 25% down, 7.5%, 30 years.
Rent-to-price
5.8%
A year of rent over the typical value.
Effective property tax
1.28%
Median tax over median value, owner-occupied homes (Census ACS); a rental can be taxed higher.
Insurance, median
$1,350 a year
What owners report paying (Census ACS); a landlord policy can differ.
Rental vacancy
3.3%
Unemployment
4.5%
Jobs down 0.2% over a year (federal labor statistics).
New homes permitted
5 per 1,000 households
Census Building Permits, latest year.
Flood insurance claims
428
NFIP claims since 2005 across the area's counties.
The typical house, worked out
| Price | $423,700 |
| Loan (75%) | $317,775 |
| Principal and interest (7.5%, 30 years) | $2,222 |
| Property tax | $452 |
| Insurance | $113 |
| Full monthly payment | $2,787 |
| Rent (HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent) | $2,043 |
| DSCR: rent ÷ full payment | 0.73x |
DSCR is the monthly rent divided by the full monthly payment. We use 1.20x as a cushion; many DSCR lenders accept as low as 1.00x. A lender sizes the loan on the lease or the appraiser's rent estimate for the specific house, often the lower of the two, not on an area figure.
The 1 county in this area
- Worcester County, MA335,826 households
How this screen is made
A market screen is built from official county data only: the HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent and its 3-bedroom figure, Census household-survey values, taxes, insurance and vacancy, Census building permits, federal unemployment statistics and NFIP flood claims. It updates when those sources do. Owner-occupied homes can carry a homestead exemption or assessment cap that a rental does not get, so a rental's tax can run higher, notably in states such as Florida and Texas. It carries no monthly interpretation; markets with a monthly hub get that on their own page. The rent is the HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent, which can sit below what a single-family house rents for, so the ratio here is cautious.