Keith County, Nebraska Eviction Risk: Low

Keith County sits in the western Nebraska Panhandle fringe along the South Platte River corridor, anchored by Ogallala - the county seat and by far its largest community, home to roughly 4,777 of the county's 6,108 residents. Landlords and tenants operating here encounter a 2.6/10 eviction risk score (Low), placing Keith County at 43rd of 93 Nebraska counties when ranked from highest to lowest risk. That means 42 counties across the state carry a higher risk reading, while 50 sit lower - squarely in the middle band of Nebraska's risk distribution.

Scores across Keith County's nine incorporated places span a tight range, from 2.3 to 2.8/10. Brule, a small agricultural community of about 346 residents along the Platte, registers the county's highest individual reading at 2.8/10. Ogallala itself lands at 2.6/10 - essentially matching the county average - reflecting its mix of retail-service renters, Lake McConaughy seasonal workers, and long-term agricultural households. Paxton (pop. 622) comes in at 2.4/10, while smaller places like Belmar (2.6/10), Roscoe (2.5/10), Lemoyne (2.4/10), and Martin (2.4/10) all cluster at or just below the county mean. Sarben, the county's smallest incorporated place at 21 residents, anchors the low end at 2.3/10. The compressed score band tells a consistent story: Keith County's rental market is structurally low-risk across virtually every community, driven by modest rents, limited tenant-protection ordinances, and a landlord-favorable state statute.

The broader rental picture supports that reading. Average asking rent countywide is roughly $690 per month - well below Nebraska's urban metros - and the average rent burden sits at 27.1%, meaning typical renter households here spend just over a quarter of gross income on housing. Renter households make up about 31.6% of occupied units, below the national average, in a county where owner-occupancy has historically been the dominant tenure. Poverty runs at 13.2%, which is meaningful in a rural county where thin margins can turn a single missed paycheck into a housing crisis, but the low base rent limits the frequency and severity of nonpayment disputes that drive eviction filings. Nebraska's eviction framework under Neb. Rev. Stat. § 76-1401 et seq. applies uniformly statewide, and Keith County's courts handle a low volume of residential landlord-tenant cases relative to Douglas or Lancaster counties. Against 2.9 as a benchmark, Keith County's score tracks close to the statewide average - there is no dramatic outlier dynamic at play here, just a consistent rural-Nebraska profile where a compact housing stock, modest rents, and a tenant-protective statute floor keep risk low without suppressing it to negligible levels.

Keith County's Low rating reflects a rental market where statutory protections are real but modest, rents are affordable relative to local incomes, and landlord-tenant disputes rarely escalate to contested court proceedings. The county's position at 43rd of 93 Nebraska counties places it in the middle of the statewide distribution - neither the easiest nor the most fraught operating environment, but comfortably on the lower end of risk for landlords and the lower end of displacement pressure for tenants.