Clay County

Clay County sits at a median home price of $110,745, which immediately signals affordability territory, but the dataset carries a notable gap: cap rate, estimated cash flow, cash-on-cash return, monthly mortgage, and estimated expenses are all listed at zero, meaning the tool hasn't produced a complete income model for this county. What the data does show is a 7.22% year-over-year home price appreciation rate and a perfect affordability index score of 100, alongside a 93 out of 100 appreciation score. That combination tells a clear directional story: this is a market where the thesis, if one exists, is price growth rather than income yield. Without rent estimates or a cap rate, you cannot underwrite a cash-flow deal from this data alone. You would need to source local rent comps independently before committing capital.

Given the scoring breakdown, the investor this market suits most directly is someone hunting for a low-entry-price appreciation play in rural Illinois. The $110,745 purchase price requires only a $22,149 down payment at 20%, which keeps the capital commitment modest. The 7.22% annual price appreciation is a real number worth taking seriously in a county at this price point, and the affordability score of 100 suggests there's room for price discovery without valuation risk at the top end. That said, the cash-flow score is listed at zero, which is not a rounding artifact but an absence of data. Any investor whose strategy depends on day-one positive cash flow should treat this as an incomplete picture requiring additional due diligence, not a confirmed cash-flow market. The stability score of 50 further tempers enthusiasm: this is not a market signaling low risk or predictable occupancy, which makes the appreciation bet a higher-conviction call that needs to be earned with local research.

No economic anchors or employer data were provided for Clay County, so no claims can be made about the local job base, major employers, or demand drivers. For a county of 13,248 people, that absence is itself a signal worth sitting with. Small, rural Illinois counties without identifiable economic anchors can see appreciation driven by regional migration or agricultural land dynamics rather than employment growth, and those trends can reverse. Before underwriting appreciation as a primary return driver, an investor should understand specifically what is moving prices at 7.22% annually in a county this size.

The tax and insurance picture here is a genuine underwriting problem. Illinois carries a state-average effective property tax rate of 2.27%, flagged as very high, and that rate deserves its own dedicated line on any pro forma. On the $110,745 purchase price, that translates to $2,514 in annual property taxes. Combined with $299 in estimated annual insurance, the monthly tax-and-insurance carry is $234 before a single dollar of mortgage payment, maintenance, management, or vacancy reserve. On a sub-$111,000 asset, $234 per month in fixed carry is a meaningful drag, particularly if gross rent comes in anywhere near where rural Illinois rent levels typically sit. The note accompanying this data is important: 2.27% is a state-average estimate from Tax Foundation 2024, and actual rates at the county or township level may differ materially. Before closing, confirm the specific assessed value and millage rate for any property you're targeting in Clay County. If the actual rate is higher than the state average, the cash-flow math gets harder still.

The primary risk here is concentration and scale. A county of 13,248 people has a thin rental market by definition, and any single-tenant or single-property problem, vacancy, non-payment, a deteriorating asset, has an outsized impact on returns when the market itself offers limited re-leasing depth. The stability score of 50 reflects this. There is no vacancy or crime data in the provided dataset to cite specifically, but a market this small with a middling stability score warrants conservative vacancy assumptions in any model you build.

Compared to the five neighboring counties provided, Clay's $110,745 median sits near the bottom of the group: Vermilion County comes in lower at $93,310, while Richland ($132,577), Marshall ($131,595), Menard ($198,736), and Massac ($112,844) are all priced higher. All five neighbors carry overall scores of 80 or 81 versus Clay's 82, so the differentiation on score alone is minimal. The one neighbor with rent data is Vermilion County, which shows a median rent of $815 and a rent-to-price ratio of 10.49%, a figure that would represent genuinely useful cash-flow potential if replicated at Clay's price point. If cash flow is your objective, Vermilion's documented rent-to-price ratio makes it a more defensible underwrite than Clay given the current data gap. Choose Clay over its neighbors only if you have independent rent data supporting the income model, you're comfortable with the Illinois tax burden, and you have a specific conviction on continued price appreciation in this rural corridor.