Rainier, Washington.
Typical home $509,700 (+0.8% in a year). Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,558 (+140%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $3,912 +1%
- $505,788$509,700 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $71,199 +16%
- $438,501$509,700 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.
- Rainier$2,675
- Washington$3,084
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 23 years.
Typical home values in Rainier, WA rose 0.8% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Rainier, Thurston County, Washington
Rainier is a city of 2,369 people in Thurston County. Half its households earn more than $106,019 a year and half less, against $96,563 across Thurston County; 15% of its people live below the poverty line. 86% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 14% are rented. Unemployment in Thurston County was 4.3% in August 2026, and the county had 0.8% 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Rainier is a small city where most homes are lived in by their owners, a good deal more so than in many places. Household incomes run above the county's, and residents tend to be somewhat younger than in much of the country. Winters are cold and wet without being harsh, with only a little snow, and summers are mild and warm.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, with restaurants and hotels, the building trades and shops also employing many. The commute is a long one, and a good number of people work from home. Across Thurston County, some of the largest workplaces are the Washington State Department of Health, Providence St. Peter Hospital and North Thurston Public Schools.
Things to do. Several small lakes sit a short drive away, including Lake Lawrence, a reservoir, and Fiander Lake. A longer drive brings you to the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge, a protected area along the Nisqually River, and to Millersylvania State Park.
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- 788households
- 22%of adults have a degree
- 15%below the poverty line
- 38 mintypical commute
- 24%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Thurston County had 129,835 jobs in 2025, 0.8% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in December, with highs near 45° and lows near 33°; warmest in August, with highs near 78° and lows near 50°. About 4 inches of snow and 51 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Olympia Airport weather station, 12 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Thurston County
- Washington State Department of Health (Tumwater)Health program administration2,210
- Providence St. Peter HospitalGeneral hospital2,112FTE
- Headquarters WSDOTTransportation1,857
- North Thurston Public SchoolsSchool district1,716FTE
- Dshs1,150
- Olympia School DistrictSchool district1,081FTE
- HeadquartersEnvironmental protection program administration1,057
- Department of Children Youth and Families1,006
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 202 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 36,260 people in all across the county; Rainier has none of its own. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) 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
- EarthquakesRelatively high
- LandslidesRelatively moderate
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
- Heat wavesRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Rainier’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 Thurston County and the Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA metro.
Rainier home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Rainier$509,700
- Washington$587,533
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Rainier 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.
- Rainier33.27%
- United States26.90%
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Rainier28
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Rainier8
Zip codes with a Rainier address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Rainier — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.