Central City, Illinois.
Typical home $92,478 (+11.8% in a year). Centralia, IL metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$142 (+41%) since Feb 2021.
- 1 year
- Up $9,779 +12%
- $82,699$92,478 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Down $7,686 -8%
- $100,164$92,478 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.
- Central City$485
- Illinois$1,553
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, prices here aren't rising.
Typical home values in Central City, IL rose 11.8% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Central City, Marion County, Illinois
Central City is a village of 1,098 people in Marion County. 71% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 29% are rented. Unemployment in Marion County was 4.2% in August 2026, and the county had 0.6% fewer jobs in 2025 than 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Central City is a small village in Marion County, Illinois, where most homes are lived in by their owners and typical home values are modest. Poverty is more common here than in most places, and few adults hold a four-year degree. Winters are cold and summers are warm, with some snow in winter and plenty of rain across the year.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, followed by manufacturing, other services and shops. Across Marion County, some of the biggest workplaces are North American Lighting, SSM Health ST. Marys Hospital and Walmart. The commute is short, and almost nobody works from home. Unemployment across the county is lower than it was a year ago, though the county has slightly fewer jobs than the year before.
Things to do. Fan's Field, a stadium, and Raccoon Lake, a reservoir, are both in or beside town. A short drive away is the Big Muddy River, and a longer drive leads to Carlyle Lake, a large reservoir with water and open shoreline. For a look at history, the Vandalia State House State Historic Site, a museum, is also a longer drive away.
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- 487households
- 6%of adults have a degree
- 29%below the poverty line
- 16 mintypical commute
- 1%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Marion County had 12,335 jobs in 2025, 0.6% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 39° and lows near 21°; warmest in July, with highs near 88° and lows near 66°. About 12 inches of snow and 45 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Iuka Southwest weather station, 9 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Marion County
- North American LightingMotor vehicle electrical and electronic equipment manufacturing1,078
- SSM Health St. Marys HospitalGeneral hospital385FTE
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters280
- Centralia HSD 200School district261FTE
- American Bath GroupPlumbing fixtures, plastics or fiberglass, manufacturing243
- Radiac AbrasivesAbrasive products manufacturing220
- Salem Township HospitalCritical access hospital184FTE
- Conagra BrandsCommercial bakeries181
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 42 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 5,146 people in all across the county; Central City has one of its own. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) 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
- Strong windVery high
- EarthquakesRelatively high
- Heat wavesRelatively high
- Cold 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 Central City’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively high. 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 Marion County and the Centralia, IL metro.
Central City home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Central City$92,478
- Illinois$295,943
- United States$366,157
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.
Zip codes with a Central City address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Central City — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zillow publishes no zip-level series with this city on the address.