Highland Falls, NY 10928: What It Costs to Buy, Rent, or Invest Here

Where the numbers disagree, and why

Ask three data vendors for the Highland Falls home value and expect three different numbers, because each measures something different: an automated estimate, an assessment baseline, or a thin sample of a few dozen zip-level listings.

The first two rows alone span $282,000 to $425,000 for what several pages call the same number. Neither figure is incorrect; one is a tax-assessment median, the other an automated valuation estimate, and they answer different questions.

Is the 10928 zip code the same as Highland Falls village? Mostly, but not exactly. The village of Highland Falls sits inside the Town of Highlands, which also includes the hamlet of Fort Montgomery under a different zip code, 10922. A “10928” search and a “Highland Falls” search return close to the same set of homes; a “Highlands, NY” or “Town of Highlands” search pulls in Fort Montgomery too.

What recently sold in the village core

The seven most recent recorded sales in Highland Falls, dated March through April 2026, give a clearer picture than any published average:

Source: Trulia, MLS GRID data, current through April 2026.

The median across these seven is $275 per square foot; the range runs from $119 to $517. The high end belongs to 20 Drew Ave, a 708-square-foot two-bedroom that closed at $366,000 on March 6, 2026, a small home priced like a much larger one, likely reflecting a full renovation. The low end, 13 Muller Ave at $119 per square foot, is a larger 1,344-square-foot home that sold for $160,000, more consistent with deferred maintenance or a distressed sale than with a market floor. A buyer comparing a single listing to the median should check which end of this spread the specific house resembles first.

Why does price per square foot vary so much between these sales? Size and condition move in opposite directions here. The smallest home in this set sold at the highest rate per square foot, and one of the larger homes sold at the lowest, which points to renovation status and lot characteristics mattering more than square footage in a market this small.

Renting in 10928

Average apartment rent in Highland Falls was $1,872 a month as of mid-2026, down from figures near $2,005 to $2,007 for one- and two-bedroom units published roughly a year earlier by the same site. That shift is more likely a change in which units happened to be listed at the time of each snapshot than a real cooling trend, given how few active listings this market carries at once. For a buyer weighing rental income, a range of $1,850 to $2,050 for a one- or two-bedroom unit is a safer planning band than either single figure.

Source: Apartments.com market data, current listing average, and its market trend page, as of December 2024.

Does West Point affect rental prices here? Yes; see the West Point section below for how, through informal subletting rather than published lease listings.

Property taxes: what owners pay

The effective property tax rate on Highland Falls homes is 2.44% of assessed value, translating to a median annual bill of $6,823, lower than the Orange County-wide average of 2.78% but still more than double the 1.02% national median.

Schools: three grades in one district

Highland Falls Central School District runs three schools, and the village assigns children to them by grade band, so which school a family gets depends on the child’s age, not the block they buy on.

Sources: Niche, SchoolDigger, GreatSchools.

Why do school ratings for this district look inconsistent? They aren’t rating the same school twice; three different schools inside one small district carry three different grades, A- at the elementary level, B+ at the middle grades, back up to A at the high school.

A buyer choosing a house based on “the school district” without checking which specific school a given grade level attends is comparing the wrong number to the wrong building.

West Point and the rental market it creates

The United States Military Academy sits immediately adjacent to the village, and its presence shapes the rental market in a way no vendor page states directly. Residents describe, in reviews posted to Niche, rent being pushed up by cadets renting apartments through their parents when they are not authorized to hold off-post leases, competing for the same small pool of units as civilian renters. That is resident-reported experience, not an audited statistic, and it should be weighed as texture rather than a verified figure, but it fits a rental market this thin: a few dozen listed units absorbing demand from both the civilian workforce and an unofficial cadet sublet channel.

Source: Niche resident reviews.

Can I verify the cadet-subletting effect before I rely on it? Not through an official source. It comes from resident reviews, not a lease-market audit, so treat it as a plausible contributor to tight rental supply, not a quantified cause.

What newcomers get surprised by

• Winter parking: streets without a private driveway require moving cars to a municipal lot during plowing, and one review recounts roughly a 15-minute walk back from that lot in bad weather.
• A single supermarket and a single gas station: reviewers describe both as priced accordingly, since neither has an in-village competitor.
• A thin listing pool: with roughly 50 to 60 recorded sales a year across the whole village, a specific house type, price band, or school-adjacent block can sit without a comparable listing for months.

Source: Niche resident reviews.

For investors: short-term rentals and what’s actually confirmed

New York State’s short-term-rental registry law took effect March 25, 2025, requiring hosts to register with the state Department of State or a municipal system and giving villages explicit power to enforce against unregistered listings. What isn’t independently confirmed is whether the Village of Highland Falls has layered its own permit, fee, or occupancy-cap ordinance on top of that state baseline, the way some neighboring Hudson Valley towns have done. Vacation-rental marketing sites claim village-specific rules exist, but none cite a local code section, so that claim isn’t reliable enough to repeat here as fact. An investor should confirm current village code directly with the Highlands Village Clerk’s office before assuming short-term rental is either unrestricted or subject to a specific local permit.

Sources: New York Department of State; News10 coverage of S885C/A4130C.

Can I run a short-term rental in Highland Falls? At minimum, register under the New York State law. Beyond that, the village-specific rule is unconfirmed; verify with the Village Clerk before listing a property.

Village core vs. Fort Montgomery: one data point, not a verdict

Only one independently sourced Fort Montgomery sale was available at the time of writing: 751 Route 9W, a 2,076-square-foot, 3-bedroom, 2.5-bath home that closed at $550,000, or $265 per square foot, close to the $275 median from the seven Highland Falls village sales above. That is one transaction against seven, not enough to support a comparison table, so any claim that Fort Montgomery homes run meaningfully cheaper or pricier than the village core should be treated as unverified until more Fort Montgomery sales data becomes available.

Source: Trulia, MLS GRID data.

Commute, briefly

Highland Falls sits roughly fifty miles up the Hudson from Manhattan, reachable by car via the Palisades Parkway. There is no direct commuter rail station in the village itself.