Midwest Metro Entry Price Tenant Demand

Wichita, Cleveland, and Detroit offer the strongest low-price/high-stability combination among major Midwest metros — Madison and Milwaukee sit at the other end, cheap tenants can't be found and pricing has run ahead of income.

Composite Score	Home Value Pctile	Value-to-Income Pctile	MF Occupancy %	Retention Rate %	Median DOM	1-Yr Job Growth %
62.71	39	25	96.7%	68.9%	42	1.87%
56.1	49	41	93.8%	76.5%	58	1.16%
54.9	59	51	95.7%	72.4%	51	0.91%
53.9	57	39	95.3%	70.9%	51	-0.17%
53.0	61	39	95.0%	69.6%	62	3.24%
51.8	74	65	96.9%	70.7%	47	0.91%
50.4	76	55	96.0%	71.1%	52	1.66%
49.9	63	43	95.0%	71.9%	75	0.67%
49.2	63	46	94.5%	69.3%	58	1.43%
49.1	78	77	96.2%	71.4%	48	1.06%
46.9	69	54	94.4%	68.7%	56	2.09%
46.5	82	61	94.8%	72.5%	63	0.82%
46.2	70	52	94.1%	69.2%	61	2.06%
44.1	61	43	92.4%	68.2%	60	1.35%
35.2	86	77	91.9%	69.5%	76	4.08%

Wichita tops the list — it has the cheapest housing in the pool (lowest median-home-value percentile nationally at 39th) , the most affordable value-to-income ratio (25th percentile) , and the fastest-absorbing rental market (42-day median days-on-market, the quickest of the 15) . It's a small, less liquid market, but the fundamentals line up.

Cleveland and Detroit back that up at scale. Cleveland posts the highest tenant retention in the set (76.5%) alongside below-average home values (49th percentile) — renewals are sticking even as rents stay approachable. Detroit pairs a mid-50s value percentile with 95.7% occupancy and a milder 12-month occupancy slide than most peers , suggesting demand is holding rather than eroding.

St. Louis and Des Moines round out the top five: St. Louis combines a sub-60th value percentile with the tightest value-to-income ratio tied with Des Moines (39th) , while Des Moines carries the fastest job growth in the pool (3.2% trailing 12 months) — the one market here where price is cheap and the demand driver (jobs) is actually accelerating rather than just steady.

Grand Rapids is worth flagging separately: it has the highest multifamily occupancy of any metro in the set (96.9%) , but that tightness is already showing up in price — a mid-70s value percentile and value-to-income ratio — so it screens as "stable demand, no longer cheap."

Madison and Milwaukee anchor the bottom. Both carry the priciest entry cost relative to income in the pool — tied at the 77th value-to-income percentile — and Madison additionally shows the steepest occupancy pullback (-4.0% over 12 months) and slowest lease absorption (76 days) of any metro screened, a combination that argues against calling its tenant demand "stable" right now.

Bottom line: if the mandate is genuinely "cheap basis + demand that isn't wobbling," Wichita, Cleveland, and Detroit are the metros to underwrite first; Kansas City, Minneapolis, Columbus, and Indianapolis cluster in the middle with at least one soft spot (Indianapolis's occupancy fell -4.0% over the year, the second-steepest drop in the set) ; Madison and Milwaukee are the ones to pass on for this specific thesis, not because they're bad markets, but because they've priced past "low entry."

Happy to push this down to the submarket or zip level in any of these five if you want to narrow the buy box further.