Charleston, Vermont.
Typical home $262,969 (+2.0% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$717 (+108%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $5,248 +2%
- $257,721$262,969 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $31,757 +14%
- $231,212$262,969 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.
- Charleston$1,380
- Vermont$2,057
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 27 years.
Typical home values in Charleston, VT rose 2.0% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Charleston, Orleans County, Vermont
Charleston is a town of 1,021 people in Orleans County. 87% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 13% are rented. Unemployment in Orleans County was 3.2% in August 2026, and the county had 2.0% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then construction.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Charleston is a small rural town in Orleans County, Vermont, where nearly everyone owns the home they live in. Incomes in the county run on the modest side, and a good number of residents live below the poverty line. Few adults hold a four-year degree, and winters are long and cold, with a great deal of snow each year and mild, comfortable summers.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, the building trades, professional and business services, and transport, warehouses and utilities. Across Orleans County, the largest workplaces include North Country Hospital & Health CTR, Galvion and Walmart. The typical commute is a long one, and a fair number of people work from home. Jobs across the county slipped a little in the most recent year, though unemployment has held steady.
Things to do. Water is close at hand: Echo Lake and Lake Seymour lie in or beside town, and Lake Willoughby is a short drive away. The Haskell Free Library and Opera House, a theatre, is also a short drive away. For a longer outing, Lake Memphremagog is a longer drive.
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- 464households
- 14%of adults have a degree
- 12%below the poverty line
- 26 mintypical commute
- 19%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Orleans County had 10,320 jobs in 2025, 2.0% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 24° and lows near 3°; warmest in July, with highs near 76° and lows near 55°. About 115 inches of snow and 45 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Island Pond weather station, 8 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Orleans County
- North Country Hospital & Health CTRCritical access hospital349FTE
- GalvionSporting goods manufacturing325
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters260
- North Country Union High School DistrictSchool district168FTE
- Columbia Forest ProductsHardwood veneer or plywood manufacturing163
- Lake Region Union Elementary Middle School DistrictSchool district115FTE
- Derby School DistrictSchool district109FTE
- TivolyTools and accessories for machine tools manufacturing97
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 20 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 2,075 people in all across the county; Charleston 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
- Winter weatherRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms across Orleans County, 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 Orleans County.
Charleston home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Charleston$262,969
- Vermont$391,900
- 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.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Charleston7
Zip codes with a Charleston address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Charleston — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.