Ames, IA Housing Market Forecast — July 2026
Typical home value $283,162 as of June 2026 · Stabilizing
Blue: typical Ames home value (Zillow ZHVI, smoothed and seasonally adjusted), last 10 years. Amber dash: forecast path through July 2027; dotted lines mark the 80% confidence range, which widens with the horizon.
Why the model sees it this way
Sialim's model forecasts the typical Ames home value will hold near flat in July 2026, from $283,162 to about $283,547. The 80% confidence range runs from $283,168 to $283,814.
Prices have been close to flat over the past three months (+0.12% per month on average), and the market is up 3.1% from a year ago.
The 30-year mortgage rate sits near 6.5% (elevated for affordability); for-sale inventory is about even with a year ago (+7%); national unemployment is 4.2%. For this metro the price-only model outperformed the macro-augmented one in backtesting, so the forecast leans on the price trend itself.
Over the most recent six-month test window, this model's predictions for Ames were off by 0.2% on average. Smaller is better; anything under 1% is strong for monthly home values.
How this compares with Zillow's forecast
| Horizon | Sialim | Zillow's forecast |
|---|---|---|
| Next month | +0.14% | +0.10% |
| Three months | +1.39% | +0.10% |
| Twelve months | +3.84% | +0.50% |
Both forecasts point the same direction for Ames over the next twelve months. Zillow forecast © Zillow, shown for comparison; horizons are aligned to the nearest published month. Agreement or disagreement between the two models is a useful signal either way.
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Frequently asked questions
What is the Ames home value forecast for July 2026?
$283,547, a +0.14% change from the latest value of $283,162. The 80% confidence range is $283,168 to $283,814.
Is the Ames housing market cooling or heating up?
Sialim classifies Ames as "Stabilizing". Monthly price changes have flattened out near zero.
What is the Ames home price forecast for 2027?
Sialim's model projects $294,030 by July 2027, a +3.84% change from today's $283,162. The 80% range is $290,078 to $297,624; year-ahead forecasts carry much wider uncertainty than next-month calls.
How accurate is this forecast?
Over the most recent six-month test window, this model's Ames predictions were off by 0.2% on average.
Model details
Forecasts come from Sialim's proprietary forecasting engine, which runs several competing model specifications for every metro, backtests them against what actually happened, and publishes the winner for each horizon. Trained on 208 monthly observations (2009-03-31 to 2026-06-30). This metro's market heat index reads 52, with 0.2% of listings showing a price cut. See the methodology for how forecasts are built, and the ZHVI guide for what the underlying index measures.
Forecasts are model output, not advice. Data: Zillow ZHVI (© Zillow), Freddie Mac via FRED, US Bureau of Labor Statistics via FRED.