Dekalb, Illinois.
Typical home $260,812 (+4.0% in a year), asking rent $1,320 (+7.9%). Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$774 (+130%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $10,028 +4%
- $250,784$260,812 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $72,910 +39%
- $187,902$260,812 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.
- Dekalb$1,369
- Illinois$1,553
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 11 years.
Typical home values in Dekalb, IL rose 4.0% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Dekalb, IL rose 7.9% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Dekalb runs $862/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $870 in May 2024.
That is $2,181 a month against $1,320 rent: a $1,369 mortgage payment, plus $533 property tax and $279 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Dekalb
The owning line is the typical home's monthly payment at that month's rate, plus property tax and insurance & upkeep; the renting line is the typical asking rent; the grey line is the mortgage payment on its own. Same homes, same months, both ways of paying for a roof.
- Owning all in$2,181
- Renting$1,320
- Mortgage only$1,369
Property tax · $533/mo 2.45% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for DeKalb County, IL
Insurance & upkeep · $279/mo insurance, maintenance and repairs together, from the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey — the national figure for mortgaged homeowners, scaled to this market's home value. BLS publishes the three bundled and they cannot be split.
Both are priced off the same month's home value, so they rise with the market. Neither is a quote — a specific home's bill depends on its assessment, its age and its insurer.
Living in Dekalb, DeKalb County, Illinois
Dekalb is a city of 40,290 people in DeKalb County. Half its households earn more than $46,481 a year and half less, against $70,724 across DeKalb County; 25% of its people live below the poverty line. 42% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 58% are rented. Unemployment in Dekalb was 4.5% in August 2026, and DeKalb County had 0.6% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then restaurants and hotels.
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. DeKalb is a college city, and it shows in who lives here: residents are much younger than in most American towns, and renters outnumber owners. Incomes run well below the county's, and more people live below the poverty line than is typical, which goes along with a large student population. Winters are cold, with highs in January staying below freezing, and a good deal of snow falls each year, while July brings warm summer days.
Work. Work in DeKalb centres on schools, hospitals and social care, followed by restaurants, hotels and entertainment, then manufacturing and shops. Northern Illinois University is the largest workplace in town, with Target and the DeKalb school district also among the biggest. The commute is moderate, and few people work from home. Unemployment is lower than a year ago, and across the county the number of jobs has edged up.
Things to do. In town, the Egyptian Theatre is a place for films and live shows, and Ellwood House is a museum you can visit without leaving DeKalb. Huskie Stadium, also in town, is where the university's football is played. A short drive away, the Midwest Museum of Natural History is another museum, and for a longer outing Shabbona Lake State Park offers protected parkland.
Report a mistake
- 16,388households
- 34%of adults have a degree
- 25%below the poverty line
- 24 mintypical commute
- 6%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. DeKalb County had 36,506 jobs in 2025, 0.6% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 28° and lows near 13°; warmest in July, with highs near 83° and lows near 63°. About 33 inches of snow and 37 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the De Kalb weather station, 2 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Dekalb
- Northern Illinois UniversityUniversity or college3,062
- TargetDiscount department stores1,524
- DeKalb CUSD 428School district1,141FTE
- AmazonCouriers and express delivery services1,139
- American Marketing & PublishingAdvertising agencies475
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters385
- 3M Company378
- TargetDiscount department stores330
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 42 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 7,656 people in all. Colleges come 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
- Cold wavesVery high
- TornadoesRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- Inland floodingrelatively high in parts of DekalbRelatively moderate
- LightningRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Dekalb’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 DeKalb County and the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI metro.
Dekalb home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Dekalb$260,812
- Illinois$295,943
- 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 3 Dekalb listings, and the typical home goes pending in 12 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.
- Dekalb33.43%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Dekalb12
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Dekalb63
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Dekalb26
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Dekalb$241,752
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Dekalb100.10%
Zip codes with a Dekalb address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Dekalb — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.