Thompson, Iowa.
Typical home $94,129 (+5.3% in a year).
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$67 (+16%) since Feb 2022.
- 1 year
- Up $4,716 +5%
- $89,413$94,129 since Sep 2025
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.
- Thompson$494
- Iowa$1,242
- United States$1,922
Typical home values in Thompson, IA rose 5.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Thompson, Winnebago County, Iowa
Thompson is a city of 495 people in Winnebago County. 81% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 19% are rented. Unemployment in Winnebago County was 3.4% in August 2026, and the county had 4.4% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most people in Winnebago 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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Thompson is a very small town in Winnebago County, Iowa, where most people know their neighbors by sight. Nearly all homes are lived in by their owners, and typical home values are modest. Winters are cold, with January the coldest month, while July is the warmest and warm without being extreme. Rain and melted snow come in a moderate amount over the year.
Work. Residents work mostly in schools, hospitals and social care, with manufacturing, shops and the building trades also employing many. Across Winnebago County, some of the largest workplaces are Winnebago, the motorhome maker, Waldorf University and the Forest City Comm School District. Unemployment in the county has eased a little over the past year, though the county has fewer jobs than it did a year earlier. A typical commute is a short one, and only a small number of people work from home.
Things to do. Lime Creek is a river a short drive away, and a good spot for a walk along the water. A longer drive brings you to Clear Lake, a lake that draws people for time on the water, and to Pilot Knob State Park, a protected area for hiking and quiet time outdoors.
Report a mistake
- 8%below the poverty line
- 22 mintypical commute
- 6%work from home
What people in Winnebago County work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Winnebago County had 3,865 jobs in 2025, 4.4% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 23° and lows near 6°; warmest in July, with highs near 81° and lows near 62°. About 36 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Forest City Nne weather station, 9 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Winnebago County
- WinnebagoMotorhome manufacturing1,230
- Iowa Cage Free LLLPChicken egg production345
- Waldorf UniversityUniversity or college335
- Forest City Comm School DistrictSchool district168FTE
- 3M Company140
- All States Ag PartsLawn maintenance machinery and equipment merchant wholesalers111
- Lake Mills Comm School DistrictSchool district104FTE
- Lake MillsSkilled nursing facilities94
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 9 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 2,134 people in all across the county; Thompson has none of its own. Colleges come from IPEDS (NCES, 2023–24) 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
- Cold wavesVery high
- DroughtRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
- HailRelatively high
- Strong windRelatively high
- TornadoesRelatively high
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Thompson’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 Winnebago County.
Thompson home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Thompson$94,129
- Iowa$236,623
- 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 Thompson address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Thompson — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.