Onaway, Michigan.
Typical home $199,170 (+9.6% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$646 (+162%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $17,461 +10%
- $181,709$199,170 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $59,465 +43%
- $139,704$199,170 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.
- Onaway$1,045
- Michigan$1,384
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 10 years.
Typical home values in Onaway, MI rose 9.6% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Onaway, Cheboygan County, Michigan
Onaway is a city of 890 people in Cheboygan County. Half its households earn more than $41,622 a year and half less, against $62,875 across Cheboygan County; 23% of its people live below the poverty line. Unemployment in Cheboygan County was 4.6% in August 2026, and the county had 0.2% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most people in Cheboygan County 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Onaway is a very small city in Cheboygan County, in the northern part of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Incomes here run well below the county's, and more households live below the poverty line than is typical, so it is a modest place where many people are getting by on little. A four-year degree is uncommon among adults, and the typical home is priced well within reach compared with much of the country. Winters are long and cold, with January highs well below freezing and a great deal of snow, while summers are pleasantly warm.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, in shops, in the building trades, and in restaurants, hotels and entertainment. Across Cheboygan County, the largest workplaces include Walmart, Thunder Bay Community Health Service and Cheboygan Area Schools. The county has lost a few jobs over the past year, and unemployment is about where it was a year earlier. The trip to work is fairly long for most people, and very few work from home.
Things to do. Onaway State Park and Black Lake are both a short drive away, and the Little Rainy River is close by as well, so time outdoors is easy to come by. With a longer drive, Burt Lake offers more open water. Fort de Buade is also a longer drive and is the choice for anyone interested in the area's history.
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- 8%of adults have a degree
- 23%below the poverty line
- 29 mintypical commute
- 4%work from home
What people in Cheboygan County work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Cheboygan County had 6,125 jobs in 2025, 0.2% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 27° and lows near 12°; warmest in July, with highs near 80° and lows near 56°. About 87 inches of snow and 32 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Onaway 4N weather station, 4 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Cheboygan County
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters325
- Cheboygan Area SchoolsSchool district199FTE
- Cheb-Otsego-Presque Isle ESDSchool district123FTE
- TF-RFabricated pipe and pipe fittings made from purchased pipe120
- Inland Lakes SchoolsSchool district90FTE
- Ken's Village MarketSupermarkets82
- MediLodge of CheboyganNursing homes72
- Cheboygan County Road CommissionConstruction management, highway, road, street and bridge44
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 11 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 831 people in all across the county; Onaway has one of its own. School districts come 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
- LightningVery high
- HailRelatively moderate
- Cold wavesRelatively 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 Onaway’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 Cheboygan County.
Onaway home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Onaway$199,170
- Michigan$263,760
- 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 Onaway listings — the market is roughly in balance.
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.
- Onaway30.18%
- United States26.36%
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Onaway23
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Onaway8
Zip codes with a Onaway address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Onaway — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.