Bolivar, Missouri.
Typical home $258,095 (+0.9% in a year), asking rent $1,002 . Springfield, MO metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$790 (+140%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $2,390 +1%
- $255,705$258,095 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $63,594 +33%
- $194,501$258,095 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.
- Bolivar$1,355
- Missouri$1,393
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 12 years.
Typical home values in Bolivar, MO rose 0.9% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Bolivar, Polk County, Missouri
Bolivar is a city of 10,679 people in Polk County. Half its households earn more than $49,622 a year and half less, against $59,647 across Polk County; 19% of its people live below the poverty line. 54% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 46% are rented. Unemployment in Polk County was 4.1% in August 2026, and the county had 3.2% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then shops.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Bolivar is a small city and the seat of Polk County, with a younger population than many places where people choose to retire. Incomes run below the county's, and more people live below the poverty line than you might expect, while more homes are lived in by their owners than rented. Winters are cold, with January the coldest month, summers turn hot by July, and the year brings a fair amount of rain and melted snow.
Work. Most residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, followed by shops, professional and business services, and manufacturing. Among the biggest workplaces in town are Citizens Memorial Hospital District, Southwest Baptist University and Bolivar R-I Schools. Unemployment in the county is a little lower than a year ago, though the county has fewer jobs than it did the year before, and the usual commute is a short one.
Things to do. Plaster Stadium sits in or beside town, and Walnut Creek and the Ozark Cavefish National Wildlife Refuge are a short drive away. For a longer outing, Pomme de Terre Lake, a reservoir, and Fantastic Caverns, a tourist attraction, are both a longer drive away.
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- 4,475households
- 28%of adults have a degree
- 19%below the poverty line
- 22 mintypical commute
- 10%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Polk County had 9,202 jobs in 2025, 3.2% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 43° and lows near 22°; warmest in July, with highs near 89° and lows near 67°. About 46 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Bolivar Northeast weather station, 2 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Bolivar
- Citizens Memorial Hospital DistrictGeneral hospital995FTE
- Southwest Baptist UniversityUniversity or college474
- Bolivar R-I SchoolsSchool district384FTE
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters365
- White River Marine GroupBoat yards215
- Citizens Memorial Health Care FoundationNursing homes123
- Citizens Memorial Healthcare FacilityNursing homes123
- Citizens Memorial Healthcare FoundationHome health care agencies57
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 11 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 1,104 people in all. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023), colleges from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24) and school districts from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24); 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
- LightningVery high
- Ice stormsRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- Heat wavesRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Bolivar’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively moderate. 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 Polk County and the Springfield, MO metro.
Bolivar home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Bolivar$258,095
- Missouri$265,387
- United States$366,157
Levy by levy, and a check of one home’s own bill, the site covers Ohio’s property tax.
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 4 Bolivar listings, and the typical home goes pending in 21 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.
- Bolivar26.87%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Bolivar21
- United States21
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Bolivar133
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Bolivar35
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Bolivar$256,725
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Bolivar97.80%
Zip codes with a Bolivar address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Bolivar — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.