Faro Labs / Markets / Dayton, OH
Dayton real estate investment market
What a typical rental in Dayton, Ohio costs, rents for, and returns: underwritten by Faro's own engine, not a scraped summary.
Returns assume 20% down at 6.75% over 30 years, 7% vacancy, and standard operating costs: Faro's default assumptions, the same ones every report starts from. Home value and rent trends as of 2026-05-31.
Cash-flow market
A typical Dayton rental covers itself: $141,452 at $1,220 a month leaves $46 after the mortgage and operating costs. The return here is money arriving monthly, which you can verify, rather than a bet on prices.
The price a deal actually works at
Faro models five price points for Dayton, from a weak buy to a strong one. The market-rate deal is $141,452; a good buy is $127,307 and a great one $113,162 roughly 20% below market value. Those are the bars a specific listing gets measured against when you run it.
How Dayton compares
Of the 210 markets Faro publishes, Dayton is the 205th most expensive to buy into: 64% below the median covered market, and the 7th strongest on rent-to-price. Within Ohio it's the 4th priciest of 6 markets we cover. On the last year of home-value change it ranks 67th.
A typical property here clears $46 a month at market rent, so it could absorb a rent drop to about $1,163 before it stopped covering itself.
What each tier costs in Dayton
Faro models five price points per market. A listing gets measured against these bars, not against a national average.
| Tier | Purchase price | Market rent | vs. market rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Weak buy | $155,597 | $1,159/mo | +10% |
| Fair buy | $148,525 | $1,196/mo | +5% |
| Market rate | $141,452 | $1,220/mo | — |
| Good buy | $127,307 | $1,281/mo | -10% |
| Great buy | $113,162 | $1,342/mo | -20% |
A typical Dayton deal, underwritten
The market-rate property above, run through the same engine every Faro report uses.
| Purchase price | $141,452 |
|---|---|
| Monthly rent | $1,220 |
| Cash required (20% down + 3% closing) | $32,534 |
| Net operating income | $9,361/yr |
| Monthly cash flow | $46 |
| Cap rate | 6.6% |
| Cash-on-cash return | 1.7% |
| DSCR | 1.06 |
One of the cheapest ways in
At $141,452, a typical Dayton property costs 64.4% less than the median market Faro covers: 205th most expensive of 210. Cash required at 20% down plus closing is about $32,534, which is what makes markets like this the usual starting point for a first rental. The trade is management: a cheap property is not a cheap property to run, and the fixed costs, a roof, a furnace, a turnover, are the same dollars against a much smaller rent.
Where it sits in Ohio
Faro covers 6 Ohio markets, and Dayton is the 4th priciest of them at $141,452. Within a single state the tax and insurance environment is broadly shared, so the differences between these markets come down to price, rent, and pace, which makes them the most useful comparison set on this page. The nearby markets listed below are the rest of that set.
Dayton investor questions
Is Dayton a good place to buy rental property?
A typical Dayton rental at $141,452 renting for $1,220 a month returns 6.6% on a cap-rate basis and clears $46 a month at 20% down. Individual deals vary far more than markets do, which is the whole reason to underwrite a specific address.
How much do you need to buy a rental in Dayton?
About $32,534 at 20% down plus 3% closing on a typical $141,452 property: one of the lower entry points among the 210 markets covered here.
Are rents going up in Dayton?
Rents moved up 2.6% over the last year, measured across 8 ZIP codes. The typical market-rate rental sits at $1,220 a month.
Where do these numbers come from?
Price and rent come from a modeled city-level benchmark dataset; the year-over-year trends are Zillow's ZHVI and ZORI indices, taken as the median across every covered ZIP so one unusual ZIP can't swing the figure. Every return metric is computed by Faro's own underwriting engine. Days on market and sale-to-list aren't shown because we have no city-level source for them we'd stand behind.
Other Ohio markets
Run the numbers yourself
A market average is not a deal.
Paste a real Dayton listing and Faro underwrites that specific property from its own comps, with a target price you can actually offer.
Estimates for analysis and educational use only: not financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. Verify every number independently before making a purchase decision.