Investing in Moberly, MO — Market Analysis
Moberly is one of the lower-basis entry points in Missouri, with a median home price around $145,000. Moberly is a smaller Missouri market. Entry prices are low and gross rent-to-price ratios are among the best in the state, but appraisers have fewer rent comps to work with, and a single vacancy is a much larger share of annual income than it would be in a metro.
Buying a rental property in Moberly on a DSCR loan means putting a minimum of $29,000 down (20% of purchase price), leaving a loan amount of $116,000 at 80% LTV. At current DSCR investor pricing near 7.50%, principal and interest on that loan runs about $811 per month. Add Randolph County property taxes of roughly $117/month and landlord insurance of about $58/month, and your all-in PITIA lands near $986/month. That PITIA figure — not the P&I — is what the lender divides your rent into.
A long-term lease in Moberly should generate roughly $1,275/month in gross rent. Against a PITIA of $986, that produces an estimated DSCR ratio of 1.29x. That clears the 1.0 minimum comfortably and puts you in the strongest DSCR pricing tier most lenders offer, which usually means a rate improvement of 0.25%–0.50% versus a break-even deal.
Two Missouri-specific items to build into your model: Missouri assesses residential property at 19% of market value and rates are set by hundreds of overlapping local districts, so the St. Louis and Kansas City suburbs vary widely block to block; Missouri also requires personal property returns on furnished short-term rentals. In Moberly specifically, effective property tax on investment property runs around 0.97% of value annually — about $1,407 a year at the median price — and landlord insurance near $696 a year.
On return metrics, Moberly pencils to an estimated cap rate of 6.54% using a 62% NOI margin, and a gross rent multiplier of 9.5. Monthly cash flow on a long-term lease at 20% down is estimated at $289 positive. A cash-flowing file at 20% down is the exception in most markets right now, and it gives you room to absorb a rate that doesn't come down.

