Sesser, Illinois.
Typical home $119,832 (+7.1% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$238 (+61%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $7,920 +7%
- $111,912$119,832 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $12,310 +11%
- $107,521$119,832 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.
- Sesser$629
- Illinois$1,553
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 32 years.
Typical home values in Sesser, IL rose 7.1% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Sesser, Franklin County, Illinois
Sesser is a city of 1,888 people in Franklin County. Half its households earn more than $52,604 a year and half less, against $56,740 across Franklin County. 72% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 28% are rented. Unemployment in Franklin County was 4.4% in August 2026, and the county had 0.8% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most people in Franklin County 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Sesser is a small city in Franklin County in southern Illinois, with a population that is small enough for neighbors to know one another. Most homes are lived in by their owners, and typical home values are modest. Household incomes run a little below the county's, and fewer adults hold a four-year degree than in many places. Winters are cold, with January the coldest month, and summers turn hot by July, with a good deal of rain and melted snow across the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with others in manufacturing, shops, and restaurants and hotels. Across Franklin County, some of the largest workplaces are Walmart, Franklin Hospital and several school districts, including Frankfort CUSD. Unemployment across the county has eased compared with a year earlier, though the county has slightly fewer jobs than it did the year before. Commutes tend to be long, and few people work from home.
Things to do. The Sesser Opera House, a theatre in or beside town, is the closest place to catch a show. Rend Lake, a reservoir a short drive away, is a popular spot for time on the water, and the West Franklin Historical Museum, also a short drive away, covers the area's local history. For a bigger day out, Crab Orchard Lake, another reservoir, lies a longer drive away.
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- 778households
- 18%of adults have a degree
- 35 mintypical commute
- 5%work from home
What people in Franklin County work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Franklin County had 9,002 jobs in 2025, 0.8% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 40° and lows near 22°; warmest in July, with highs near 88° and lows near 68°. About 46 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Rend Lake Dam weather station, 5 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Franklin County
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters293
- Frankfort CUSD 168School district237FTE
- Benton CCSD 47School district142FTE
- Christopher USD 99School district134FTE
- Franklin HospitalCritical access hospital118FTE
- Rend Lake Conservancy DistrictWater treatment and distribution97
- Sesser-Valier CUSD 196School district86FTE
- Crownline BoatsBoat yards85
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 17 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 1,106 people in all across the county; Sesser 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
- Cold wavesVery high
- Strong windRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
- EarthquakesRelatively high
- Heat wavesRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Sesser’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 Franklin County.
Sesser home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Sesser$119,832
- 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.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Sesser12
Zip codes with a Sesser address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Sesser — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.