Wilmington, North Carolina.
Typical home $416,464 (+0.2% in a year), asking rent $1,713 (+4.8%). Wilmington, NC metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,236 (+130%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $825 +0%
- $415,639$416,464 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $94,624 +29%
- $321,840$416,464 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.
- Wilmington$2,186
- North Carolina$1,743
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 13 years.
Typical home values in Wilmington, NC rose 0.2% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Wilmington, NC rose 4.8% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Wilmington runs $1,107/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $1,271 in May 2024.
That is $2,820 a month against $1,713 rent: a $2,186 mortgage payment, plus $188 property tax and $446 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Wilmington
The owning line is the typical home's monthly payment at that month's rate, plus property tax and insurance & upkeep; the renting line is the typical asking rent; the grey line is the mortgage payment on its own. Same homes, same months, both ways of paying for a roof.
- Owning all in$2,820
- Renting$1,713
- Mortgage only$2,186
Property tax · $188/mo 0.54% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for New Hanover County, NC
Insurance & upkeep · $446/mo insurance, maintenance and repairs together, from the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey — the national figure for mortgaged homeowners, scaled to this market's home value. BLS publishes the three bundled and they cannot be split.
Both are priced off the same month's home value, so they rise with the market. Neither is a quote — a specific home's bill depends on its assessment, its age and its insurer.
Living in Wilmington, New Hanover County, North Carolina
Wilmington is a city of 115,451 people in New Hanover County. Half its households earn more than $66,738 a year and half less, against $75,166 across New Hanover County; 16% of its people live below the poverty line. 48% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 52% are rented. Unemployment in Wilmington was 3.4% in August 2026, and New Hanover County had 0.9% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then professional services.
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. Wilmington is a port city on the Cape Fear River, and it is a place where renters outnumber owners. Incomes run below the county's as a whole, and a good share of adults hold a four-year degree. Winters are mild and snow is rare, summers are hot, and the year brings plenty of rain.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with professional and business services, restaurants and hotels, and shops also employing a good many. Among the largest workplaces in Wilmington are New Hanover Regional Medical Center, the University of North Carolina Wilmington and Cape Fear Community College. The typical commute is short, and a fair number of people work from home.
Things to do. The Cameron Art Museum sits in or beside town, as does the New Hanover County Extension Service Arboretum, a botanical garden. Airlie Gardens, another botanical garden, is a short drive away, and so is Thalian Hall, a theatre. For a longer outing, Fort Fisher is a longer drive away.
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- 56,612households
- 47%of adults have a degree
- 16%below the poverty line
- 18 mintypical commute
- 19%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. New Hanover County had 131,696 jobs in 2025, 0.9% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 57° and lows near 36°; warmest in July, with highs near 90° and lows near 73°. About 1 inches of snow and 60 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Wilmington International Airport weather station, 4 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Wilmington
- New Hanover Regional Medical CenterGeneral hospital5,596FTE
- University of North Carolina WilmingtonUniversity or college2,681
- New Hanover County GovernmentBoards of supervisors, county and local2,070
- Cape Fear Community CollegeTwo-year college1,489
- CorningIndustrial glassware and glass products, pressed or blown, made in glass making plants1,030
- Novant Health New Hanover Orthopedic HospitalGeneral medical and surgical hospitals590
- AramarkFood service contractors390
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters366
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 114 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 18,239 people in all. Hospitals come from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) and colleges from IPEDS (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
- HurricanesVery high
- LightningRelatively high
- Winter weatherRelatively high
- Ice stormsRelatively moderate
- Tornadoesrelatively high in parts of WilmingtonRelatively 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 Wilmington’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 New Hanover County and the Wilmington, NC metro.
Wilmington home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Wilmington$416,464
- North Carolina$332,159
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Wilmington listings, and the typical home goes pending in 24 days — the market is cooling.
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.
- Wilmington32.21%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Wilmington24
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Wilmington1,110
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Wilmington327
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Wilmington$432,337
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Wilmington97.90%
Zip codes with a Wilmington address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Wilmington — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Wilmington
| Zip activate to sort by Zip | Place activate to sort by Place | Population sorted descending, activate to sort ascending | Rent activate to sort by Rent | Home value activate to sort by Home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 28412 | Wilmington | 44,166 | $1,562 | $391,083 |
| 28403 | Wilmington | 40,319 | $1,715 | $392,554 |
| 28411 | Wilmington | 37,233 | $1,864 | $465,558 |
| 28409 | Wilmington | 36,163 | $2,201 | $510,348 |
| 28405 | Wilmington | 35,467 | $1,735 | $373,114 |
| 28401 | Wilmington | 22,007 | $1,741 | $326,327 |