Liberal, Missouri.
Typical home $201,638 (+2.3% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$578 (+120%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $4,526 +2%
- $197,111$201,638 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $47,929 +31%
- $153,708$201,638 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.
- Liberal$1,058
- Missouri$1,393
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 13 years.
Typical home values in Liberal, MO rose 2.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Liberal, Barton County, Missouri
Liberal is a city of 629 people in Barton County. Unemployment in Barton County was 3.6% in August 2026, and the county had 0.5% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then finance and property.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Liberal is a very small city in Barton County, in the southwest corner of Missouri, where people tend to know one another. Homes here cost less than the typical American home, and household incomes across the county run below the national level. Winters are cold, with January the coldest month, and summers turn hot by August. Rain and melted snow add up to a fair amount over the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with others in banks, insurance and property, in manufacturing, and in shops. Across Barton County, the largest workplaces include Walmart, Redneck Outdoor Products and Lamar R-I Schools. Most people travel a moderate distance to work, and only a few work from home. Jobs across the county were slightly fewer last year than the year before, though unemployment there has eased from a year earlier.
Things to do. Prairie State Park, a protected area, is a short drive away and is the nearest place for a walk across open country. Farther afield, Fort Scott National Historic Site is a protected area a longer drive away, and the Harry S Truman Birthplace State Historic Site is another protected area a longer drive away. Both make a fuller day out than a quick errand.
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- 295households
- 18%of adults have a degree
- 14%below the poverty line
- 25 mintypical commute
- 4%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Barton County had 3,502 jobs in 2025, 0.5% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 44° and lows near 23°; warmest in August, with highs near 89° and lows near 65°. About 46 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Joplin North weather station, 10 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Barton County
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters209
- Redneck Outdoor ProductsSporting goods manufacturing183
- Lamar R-I SchoolsSchool district162FTE
- COX Barton County HospitalCritical access hospital124FTE
- Envision Outdoor Living - LamarBuilding materials, plastics, manufacturing68
- MR Bult'sSpecialized freight trucking, long-distance64
- Leisure Time ProductsSporting goods and supplies merchant wholesalers48
- Sprouls ConstructionConstruction management, highway, road, street and bridge47
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 11 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 933 people in all across the county; Liberal has one 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
- Strong windVery high
- Ice stormsVery high
- TornadoesVery high
- DroughtRelatively high
- Inland floodingRelatively high
- Cold wavesRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Liberal’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 Barton County.
Liberal home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Liberal$201,638
- Missouri$265,387
- 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.
- Liberal6
Zip codes with a Liberal address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Liberal — 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.