If you only read headlines, you think the housing market is falling apart. Here is what actually happened in our nine towns this July, straight out of the closed-sale record: 456 homes closed. Last July, 457 did. One home apart, across an entire region, twelve months later.
That is the whole story this month, and it is a better story than the one you have been told.
The Year Is Down 243 Homes. July Was Up 15.
Both of those things are true at once, and holding them together is the only way to read this market correctly. Here is the year broken into quarters, so you can watch the gap close in real time:
| Period | 2026 closings | 2025 closings | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| January – March | 706 | 879 | −173 (−19.7%) |
| April – June | 914 | 999 | −85 (−8.5%) |
| July | 396 | 381 | +15 (+3.9%) |
Eight towns; Carbondale is held out of this quarterly table for a data reason explained at the bottom.
Look at the shape of it. The market did not gradually decline all year — it took one hard hit in the first quarter, spent the spring clawing back, and by midsummer it was outrunning last year. The 243-home deficit everyone will quote you at the end of the year was very nearly all created in January, February and March.
Marion is the clearest example. It closed 64, 61 and 49 homes in the first three months of 2026 against 95, 84 and 77 in the same months of 2025 — a hole of 182 homes dug before spring even started. Then June: 78. Then July: 97, against 100 a year ago. Same town, same year, completely different market on either side of April.
And Prices Did Not Blink
Here is the part that should end the doom talk. If falling demand were driving this, prices would have followed volume down. They did the opposite. Seven of our nine towns posted a higher median sale price this July than last July, and regional July dollar volume finished above last year at roughly $76.8 million versus $75.4 million.
| Town | July 2026 closings | July 2026 median | vs. July 2025 median |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marion | 97 | $229,949 | +9.2% |
| Mount Vernon | 74 | $164,413 | +6.8% |
| Carbondale | 60 | $152,666 | +3.5% |
| Herrin | 50 | $92,979 | −27.0% |
| Carterville | 43 | $254,943 | +2.0% |
| Murphysboro | 43 | $128,371 | −13.0% |
| West Frankfort | 35 | $145,418 | +46.1% |
| Benton | 29 | $137,869 | +42.2% |
| Du Quoin | 25 | $117,474 | +17.5% |
A word of caution on the big percentages at the bottom of that table. West Frankfort, Benton and Du Quoin are small markets — 25 to 35 closings in a month — and in a town that size a handful of nicer homes can swing the median 40% without the underlying market moving at all. Treat those as "prices are healthy here," not as "your house went up 46% this year." Herrin's −27% is the same coin flipped over: 50 closings weighted toward its lower price bands, not a town losing value.
The honest read across all nine: prices are flat to modestly up, and the volume gap is closing.
What This Means If You Are Actually Buying or Selling
🏠 If you are selling
Stop waiting for a better market — you are standing in it. Buyers came back in June and July at last year's pace, and they are paying last year's prices or better in most of our towns. What has changed is that they are selective. The homes moving quickly are the ones that are priced against what actually closed nearby in the last ninety days, not against what a neighbor listed at in the spring and never sold.
🔑 If you are buying
The window where you had the market to yourself was the first quarter, and it is closed. That is not a reason to panic — it is a reason to be ready. Competition is back to normal, not to 2021. Get pre-qualified before you tour so that when the right house shows up you can write the same day, and understand that in the under-$150,000 bands in Herrin, West Frankfort and Murphysboro you will not be the only offer.
💰 Thinking About Moving This Fall?
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Greg Holthaus Predicts: Q4 2026
July closed the year-over-year gap and I expect the fourth quarter to close it the rest of the way. My call: roughly 1,150 to 1,250 closings across these nine towns in October through December, at a blended median near $150,000 — call it $185 to $195 million in volume. That would land within a few percent of last year's fourth quarter, which after a first quarter that ran nearly 20% behind would mean the market finished the year essentially even.
Why I believe it: the deficit is not spread across the year, it is concentrated in three winter months that are already behind us, and both June and July came in at last year's pace with prices holding. Markets that are genuinely breaking do not do that. The risk to this call is rates — a sharp move up would cool the fall faster than anything local. Short of that, the pattern in this data says stability, not decline.
Southern Illinois Market FAQ
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📱 Got a Question About This Market? Text Greg.
Buying? Selling? Not sure where to start? Text Greg Holthaus directly — just tell him you saw his blog. He'll help you think through your decision, match you with the best broker for your situation, and point you in the right direction. He's open to a text any time.
Text Greg · 618.925.8654
Who is Greg Holthaus?
Greg Holthaus is the Owner and Designated Managing Broker of Southern Illinois Realty Experts, with 25+ years in Southern Illinois real estate and more than 10,000 transactions closed. He leads a full-service operation — home sales, mortgage, title, and property management under one roof — with offices in Marion, Herrin, and Carbondale. Meet Greg ›
About the numbers: Closing counts and median sale prices come from local MLS closed-sale data for the ZIP codes covering Marion, Carbondale, Mount Vernon, Herrin, Carterville, Murphysboro, Du Quoin, West Frankfort and Benton, retrieved September 7, 2026; July 2026 is the most recent complete month. Sales volume is an estimate (closings × median price), not a reported figure. Medians are monthly medians, so in the smaller towns a single month’s mix of homes can move the number more than the market itself. Carbondale note: its March–May 2026 records show medians of $30,000, $38,000 and $53,500 on unusually high closing counts — a batch of non-typical low-value recordings rather than a market shift — so those three months are excluded from the quarterly table and from Carbondale’s year-to-date comparison. Its July figures are unaffected and are reported as recorded. Nothing here is a loan offer, rate quote, or appraisal of any specific property.