Malta, Illinois.
Typical home $277,121 (+5.9% in a year). Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$841 (+137%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $15,493 +6%
- $261,628$277,121 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $86,155 +45%
- $190,966$277,121 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.
- Malta$1,455
- 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 Malta, IL rose 5.9% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Malta, DeKalb County, Illinois
Malta is a village of 1,143 people in DeKalb County. 74% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 26% are rented. Unemployment in DeKalb County was 3.7% in August 2026, and the county had 0.6% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then shops.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Malta is a small village in DeKalb County, Illinois, where most homes are lived in by their owners. Winters are cold, with a good deal of snow, and summers turn warm, with a fair amount of rain through the year. Few adults hold a four-year degree compared with many places, and the typical home value sits in a middle range for the area.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, in shops, in manufacturing, and in transport, warehouses and utilities. Across DeKalb County, some of the largest workplaces are Northern Illinois University, Kishwaukee Community Hospital and the DeKalb school district. Many people drive a fair way to their jobs, and some work from home.
Things to do. A short drive away, the Egyptian Theatre in DeKalb is a theatre for films and live shows, and Ellwood House is a museum in DeKalb. Huskie Stadium, also a short drive off, is where Northern Illinois University plays its home football games. For time outdoors, Shabbona Lake State Park is a protected area a longer drive away.
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- 435households
- 20%of adults have a degree
- 26 mintypical commute
- 12%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, 5 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in DeKalb County
- Northern Illinois UniversityUniversity or college3,062
- TargetDiscount department stores1,524
- DeKalb CUSD 428School district1,141FTE
- AmazonCouriers and express delivery services1,139
- Kishwaukee Community HospitalGeneral hospital889FTE
- Sycamore CUSD 427School district583FTE
- American Marketing & PublishingAdvertising agencies475
- The Suter CompanyVegetables, cut or peeled, fresh, manufacturing391
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 106 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 14,019 people in all across the county; Malta has none of its own. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24), school districts 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
- Cold wavesRelatively high
- DroughtRelatively moderate
- TornadoesRelatively moderate
- Strong windRelatively moderate
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Malta’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively 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 DeKalb County and the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI metro.
Malta home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Malta$277,121
- 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 Malta address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Malta — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.