Benton Harbor, Michigan.
Typical home $158,402 (+6.1% in a year), asking rent $1,065 . Niles, MI metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$440 (+113%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $9,168 +6%
- $149,234$158,402 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $25,452 +19%
- $132,950$158,402 since Sep 2021
Monthly payment to buy the typical home
Home value × that month's 30-year mortgage rate, 20% down, principal and interest. This is the line households feel: prices and rates compound each other.
- Benton Harbor$831
- Michigan$1,384
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 20 years.
Typical home values in Benton Harbor, MI rose 6.1% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Benton Harbor, Berrien County, Michigan
Benton Harbor is a city of 9,103 people in Berrien County. Half its households earn more than $31,117 a year and half less, against $65,425 across Berrien County; 40% of its people live below the poverty line. 37% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 63% are rented. Unemployment in Berrien County was 4.8% in August 2026, and the county had about as many jobs in 2025 as the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then manufacturing.
Written by AI Claude Sonnet 5.5 wrote this on 23 October 2026 from the figures here, a list of nearby places and what it knows. It can be wrong or out of date.
What it’s like
The place. Benton Harbor is a small city in Berrien County, Michigan, with a younger population than many American towns. Household incomes here are well below the county's, and far more people live below the poverty line than is typical, so money is tight for many households. Most homes are rented rather than lived in by their owners, and few adults hold a four-year degree.
Work. Residents work mainly in schools, hospitals and social care, followed by manufacturing, restaurants and hotels, and shops. Among the biggest workplaces in the city are Benton Harbor Area Schools, the auto-interior manufacturer JVIS USA, and Harbor Village at Harbor Shores. Commutes are fairly short, and few people work from home.
Things to do. Silver Beach Amusement Park and Jean Klock Park, a garden, are both in or beside town, and Fort Miami sits there too. A short drive away is Grand Mere State Park, a protected natural area, and Warren Dunes State Park is a longer drive. Winters are cold and snowy, summers are warm, and rain and melted snow add up to a fair amount over the year.
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- 3,624households
- 7%of adults have a degree
- 40%below the poverty line
- 18 mintypical commute
- 6%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Berrien County had 60,632 jobs in 2025, about as many as the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 33° and lows near 20°; warmest in July, with highs near 83° and lows near 62°. About 78 inches of snow and 38 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Benton Harbor Airport weather station, a mile away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Benton Harbor
- Benton Harbor Area SchoolsSchool district329FTE
- US Benton Harbor250
- JVIS USA LLC Benton Harbor TerritorialMotor vehicle interior systems manufacturing161
- Harbor Village at Harbor ShoresHotels, resort, without casinos123
- Benton HarborMail and parcel delivery82
- Benton Harbor Charter School AcademySchool district63FTE
- Primetals Technologies - Benton HarborRolling mill machinery and equipment, metalworking, manufacturing35
- Veterans Health AdministrationFederal government · Department of Veterans Affairs29
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 6 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 671 people in all. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24) and federal offices from OPM's federal workforce data (2026); FTE marks full-time equivalent staff. Not listed: many offices and banks, which need not report to OSHA; military bases, whose staff OPM withholds; and, in about half the states, city and county governments.
Natural hazards
- Strong windRelatively moderate
- Cold wavesRelatively moderate
- Winter weatherRelatively moderate
- TornadoesRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Benton Harbor’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, very low. It is meant for planning, not a substitute for a local risk assessment or a flood map: FEMA’s index.
From the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 census and its American Community Survey (2020–2024 five-year estimates), and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A survey, so each figure has a margin of error, and figures it is not sure of are left out. More on Berrien County and the Niles, MI metro.
Benton Harbor home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Benton Harbor$158,402
- Michigan$263,760
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Benton Harbor listings, and the typical home goes pending in 14 days — the market is cooling.
When this market ran hot
Each cell is that month's year-on-year home-value growth. Read left to right, top row is the latest year — the 2021–22 band is the boom.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Share of listings with a price cut
The early-warning dial: sellers cut when buyers stop reaching. Rising cuts cool a market months before prices notice.
- Benton Harbor28.76%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Benton Harbor14
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Benton Harbor110
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Benton Harbor40
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Benton Harbor$165,513
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
Not enough data to draw this yet.
Zip codes with a Benton Harbor address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Benton Harbor — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.