German Valley, Illinois.
Typical home $226,510 (+12.3% in a year). Freeport, IL metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$708 (+147%) since Feb 2021.
- 1 year
- Up $24,876 +12%
- $201,633$226,510 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $71,063 +46%
- $155,446$226,510 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.
- German Valley$1,189
- Illinois$1,553
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 9 years.
Typical home values in German Valley, IL rose 12.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in German Valley, Stephenson County, Illinois
German Valley is a village of 433 people in Stephenson County. Half its households earn more than $73,661 a year and half less, against $64,043 across Stephenson County; 7% of its people live below the poverty line. Unemployment in Stephenson County was 3.9% in August 2026, and the county had 0.2% more 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. German Valley is a small village in Stephenson County, among the smallest places in the area, where neighbors are likely to know one another. Household incomes run higher than across the county, and the typical home value sits in the low-to-middle range for homes in the region. Winters are cold, with a good deal of snow, and summers are warm.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, followed by manufacturing, shops and the building trades. The typical commute is a moderate one, and few people work from home. Across Stephenson County, some of the largest workplaces are Freeport Schools, FHN Memorial Hospital and Berner Foods - Dakota.
Things to do. Yellow Creek is a short drive away and makes for a quiet outing by the water. A longer drive brings you to White Pines Forest State Park, a protected area of woods and trails, and to Anderson Japanese Gardens, a botanical garden. The Pecatonica River is also a longer drive away, for those who like to be near a river.
Report a mistake
- 7%below the poverty line
- 25 mintypical commute
- 7%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Stephenson County had 17,408 jobs in 2025, 0.2% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 28° and lows near 11°; warmest in July, with highs near 82° and lows near 62°. About 34 inches of snow and 38 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Freeport Waste Wtp weather station, 8 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Stephenson County
- Helm MechanicalPlumbing and heating contractors1,273
- Freeport SD 145School district839FTE
- Berner Foods - DakotaProcessed cheeses manufacturing644
- FHN Memorial HospitalGeneral hospital557FTE
- HoneywellRheostats, current carrying wiring device, manufacturing500
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters364
- Snak-KingPotato chips manufacturing312
- Titan Tire Corporation of FreeportTires manufacturing310
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 45 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 7,283 people in all across the county; German Valley has none of its own. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24) and hospitals from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023); 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
- HailRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
- Inland floodingRelatively high
- Cold wavesRelatively high
- DroughtRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in German Valley’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 Stephenson County and the Freeport, IL metro.
German Valley home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- German Valley$226,510
- 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 German Valley address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls German Valley — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in German Valley
| Zip activate to sort by Zip | Place activate to sort by Place | Population sorted descending, activate to sort ascending | Rent activate to sort by Rent | Home value activate to sort by Home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 61047 | Leaf River | 1,622 | — | $233,782 |
| 61039 | German Valley | 824 | — | $219,950 |