Randolph County

Randolph County posts a 7.73% year-over-year home price gain against a median purchase price of $154,820, landing it at the top of the appreciation spectrum. The affordability index of 97 and the national rank of 1st out of 1,000 counties signal that this market is genuinely cheap relative to whatever income baseline drives that score, not just cheap in absolute dollar terms. The cash flow score of 0 is the honest counterweight: the data does not support a positive carry story here. No cap rate or monthly cash-on-cash figure is calculable from what's provided, which means an investor cannot underwrite this on income alone and should not try.

That profile points directly at one buyer type: the appreciation-oriented, long-horizon investor who is willing to subsidize or break-even on monthly carry in exchange for price momentum and an entry point under $155,000. A value-add operator looking to force appreciation through renovation can do so with a low dollar basis, which limits absolute downside even if market liquidity is thin. The cash-flow buyer, especially one using leverage at the current 6.85% rate, has no numerical case to make here. With monthly mortgage, tax, and insurance costs baked into a leveraged deal, the numbers simply don't pencil unless rents in specific sub-markets exceed what the county-level data reflects.

The carry cost picture deserves direct attention before anyone puts this under contract. Illinois carries a state-average effective property tax rate of 2.27%, which the Tax Foundation flags as very high, and Randolph is subject to that pressure. On a $154,820 purchase that works out to roughly $3,514 per year in property taxes and $418 in insurance, for a combined monthly tax-and-insurance load of $328. That figure alone, before mortgage principal and interest, before maintenance, before vacancy, is a real number that belongs on its own line in your underwrite. The honest caveat is that 2.27% is a state-average estimate and your actual county or township rate may be higher or lower, so pulling the specific Randolph County assessor data before closing is not optional. Illinois property taxes have historically been a margin killer on low-price-point rentals, and at this purchase price there is limited room to absorb a rate that comes in above the state average.

No economic anchor data was provided for Randolph County, so employer-level demand drivers cannot be assessed from this data set. What the population figure of 30,413 does suggest is a small, rural county where rental market depth is limited. Thin liquidity cuts both ways: it can mean less competition when acquiring, but it also means a slower exit if the appreciation thesis doesn't fully materialize on your timeline. Stability scores at 50 out of 100, which is the direct numerical expression of that risk. Concentration risk is real in a county this size: a single employer contraction or a demographic shift in a population this small moves the needle faster than in a larger metro.

Compared to the neighboring counties in the data, Randolph sits at a meaningfully higher price point than most. Vermilion County comes in at a $93,310 median with a rent-to-price ratio of 10.49%, which is the only neighbor where that ratio is provided and it tells a clear story: Vermilion is the cash-flow play in this peer group. An investor who needs income from day one should be looking at Vermilion rather than Randolph. Massac at $112,844 and Marshall at $131,595 offer lower entry prices with similar overall scores of 81, while Menard County at $198,736 is the premium outlier. Randolph's case over these neighbors rests entirely on its appreciation score of 94 and its national ranking, not on income metrics. Choose Randolph when your thesis is price growth and you have the balance sheet to carry a break-even or slightly negative monthly position for several years. Choose Vermilion when you need the rent check to service the debt.