Moving to Lemont, IL: Should You Buy a Home Here?

Lemont has three things: a historic downtown you can actually walk. An Exemplary rated high school district. The lowest property tax rate in the southwest suburbs. Every list of reasons to move to Lemont says it, too.

All of it is true. Here is what the lists leave out: Lemont's tax bill still comes in higher than most of the towns around it.

Should you buy a home in Lemont, Illinois?

Buy in Lemont if the downtown, the schools and the low rate are worth the two things that come attached to them: the highest home prices in the area and a commute you are going to drive. That is the trade, and it is a sharper trade here than in any other town out here.

Lemont scores at or near the top of my ratings on taxes, schools, and dining. It also has three inbound Metra trains a day and no weekend service at all. If your commute depends on a train, this is not your town no matter how good the rest of it looks.

What do homes in Lemont actually cost?

More than anywhere else on my list, and the gap is not small.

The median single family home that sold in Lemont in August 2026 closed at $807,000. Median asking price on active listings was $795,000, so homes sold slightly above list, at 100.3 percent of asking, in a median of nine days.

Now the number that does not match, and it matters. The median value of an owner occupied home in Lemont is about $468,800, according to the Census. That is roughly $340,000 below what closed in August.

Both numbers are real. They measure different things. The value figure describes every house in town, including the ones built in the eighties that nobody is selling this year. The sold figure describes the fifteen or twenty houses that actually changed hands in one month, and in Lemont those skew newer, larger, and more expensive. A town wide average will not tell you what your money buys. Comps on the specific street will.

One more piece of the picture that points the other direction. Homes under contract were listed at $769,000 and newly pending homes at $749,500, both below the active median. The cheaper inventory is moving and the expensive listings are sitting. Meanwhile months of supply climbed to 2.41, up 54.5 percent over twelve months. That is still a seller's market by any definition, but it is a seller's market with more competition in it than a year ago.

For current listings and where prices sit today, here is the current Lemont market data.

What will property taxes run in Lemont?

The rate is the lowest I have measured out here. The bill is not.

Lemont's median effective property tax rate runs about 1.93 percent, against a median annual bill of roughly $8,680. Compare that to Orland Park, also in Cook County, at about 2.27 percent and a median bill of roughly $7,472.

Read those two lines again. Lemont has the lower rate and the higher bill. That is not a contradiction, it is the whole lesson: the rate is not the bill. The house is the bill. A lower percentage of a much more expensive house is still more money every year, and it comes out of the same paycheck as the mortgage.

Go one town the other way and it flips again. Homer Glen, across the line in Will County, runs about 2.50 percent and a median bill near $9,912. Higher rate, higher bill, cheaper houses. Three towns, three different combinations, and none of them can be predicted from the rate alone. This is the single most common thing buyers out here get wrong, and it is why I wrote the piece on Illinois property taxes in the first place.

The Lemont address trap

This one is specific to this town, and it is the most expensive thing on this page to get wrong.

The Village of Lemont sits almost entirely in Cook County. As of the 2020 census, the village held 6,773 housing units and 6,770 of them were in Cook. The Will and DuPage portions of the village combined held three houses and nine people.

But the Lemont mailing address reaches well past the village line into unincorporated Will and DuPage County. A listing can say Lemont, IL 60439 and sit in a different county, under a different assessor, with a different appeal process and a different set of taxing bodies.

Here is what that does to the money. Lemont addresses in DuPage County run about 1.84 percent. Inside the village, in Cook, about 1.93 percent. Lemont addresses in Will County run about 2.42 percent.

Put the same $400,000 house in each one. In DuPage it carries roughly $613 a month in property taxes. In Cook, roughly $643. In Will, roughly $807. The spread between the best and worst version of the identical house is about $193 a month, or $2,320 a year, decided entirely by which side of a line the parcel sits on.

And that $193 is not only a bill. It is borrowing power. At rates in the mid sixes it is roughly $30,000 of mortgage you no longer qualify for at the same monthly payment. Run the current number rather than trusting this one, because it moves with rates. The direction never changes: the higher tax rate buys you less house for the same money.

Now the part that costs more than the taxes.

Lemont Township High School District 210, the Exemplary rated one, covers Cook County and DuPage County only. The district says so plainly: there are no residences in Will County inside its boundaries. So a Lemont mailing address in Will County sits outside the school district that is one of the main reasons people move here in the first place. Which district serves that parcel depends on the parcel, and it is a question to ask before the offer rather than after.

One thing I am not going to tell you is that the Will and DuPage addresses are "cheaper." Lemont addresses in Will show a median value near $314,000 and in DuPage near $345,000, against roughly $469,000 inside the village. But those are different houses, not the same house priced three ways. Most of the unincorporated stock is older, much of it on well and septic, and none of it carries village water, sewer or police. That could account for the entire gap on its own. I have not seen paired comps across the county line, so I am not going to pretend the county sets the price. What the county demonstrably sets is the rate.

So: confirm which county the parcel is in, whether it is inside village limits, and which school districts actually serve it, before you write an offer. Your agent can pull all three in a few minutes. It is the kind of thing nobody thinks to check, because the address looks settled.

The reassessment you are buying into

Cook County runs a three year reassessment cycle by region, and Lemont Township sits in the south and west suburban group. It was reassessed in 2020, in 2023, and again in 2026, which means the next one lands in 2029. In a reassessment year, notices go out in mid August and the Assessor's appeal window closes at the end of September. Check the Assessor's calendar for the current year's exact dates rather than trusting any article, including this one.

For a buyer, this is a timing question, not a paperwork question. The tax figure printed on a listing describes an earlier version of that property, because Illinois assesses as of January 1 and bills in arrears. In a reassessment year the gap between what the listing says and what you will actually owe is at its widest.

Two things worth doing. Pull the parcel's actual tax history before you offer, not the listing's number. And budget a cushion above the current bill rather than assuming it holds.

If you already own here and that notice is sitting on your counter, start with how to read your Cook County reassessment notice, then appealing your Cook County property taxes. Also confirm your Cook County property tax exemptions are actually on the bill, because the refund people miss most often is one they were already entitled to.

How are the schools in Lemont, IL?

Strong, and the numbers back it rather than just the reputation.

Lemont Township High School District 210 earned an Exemplary summative designation on the 2024 Illinois School Report Card, the top tier, which goes to roughly the top ten percent of schools in the state. It was the second consecutive year and the fourth time since 2019.

Proficiency, most recent reporting year: 79.1 percent in English language arts, 71.1 percent in math, 73.1 percent in science. Statewide those figures were 52.4, 38, and 44.6. Lemont is not a little above the state. It is roughly double the state in math.

One naming note that will save you confusion. Lemont Township High School District 210 is not Lincoln-Way Community High School District 210. Two different districts, same number, about twenty miles apart. If you have been reading guides to New Lenox, Frankfort or Mokena, the District 210 in those is the other one.

One boundary note that will save you more than confusion. District 210 covers Cook and DuPage County only. A Lemont mailing address in Will County is not in it. See the address trap above, because that is the single most expensive assumption you can make in this town.

Elementary and middle is Lemont-Bromberek Combined School District 113A, four schools. On the most recent report card I could verify for that district, Old Quarry Middle School earned Exemplary and the three elementaries earned Commendable.

Two honest caveats. Illinois lowered its English and math cut scores in August 2025 and applied the change retroactively, so proficiency percentages from 2025 forward are not comparable to earlier years, in Lemont or anywhere else. And designations are assigned per school and updated annually. Check illinoisreportcard.com yourself for the current year rather than taking mine, and treat GreatSchools and Niche as what they are, aggregators with their own methodologies.

What is the commute from Lemont really like?

This is the catch, and I am going to be blunt about it because the listing photos will not be.

Lemont has a Metra station. It is on the Heritage Corridor, the least used line in the Metra system at roughly 2,400 weekday riders. Here is the entire weekday schedule.

Inbound to Union Station: three trains. They leave Lemont at 6:05, 6:46 and 7:26 in the morning, arriving downtown at 6:52, 7:32 and 8:12.

Outbound from Union Station: three trains. They leave at 3:50, 4:50 and 5:30 in the afternoon, reaching Lemont at 4:31, 5:31 and 6:11.

There is no weekend service. No Saturday, no Sunday, nothing midday in either direction.

So the train works if your day starts before 8:12 and ends before 5:30, every day, and you never need it on a weekend. If you work a rotating shift, or nights, or you occasionally stay late, the station is scenery. Say that out loud before you buy, because a station on a listing sheet reads like a commuting option and this one is closer to a coincidence.

Driving is the real answer, and it is a good one. Lemont sits about 28 driving miles from the Loop by way of I-55, and I-355 runs through the village with an interchange at Lemont Road. That is genuinely close by southwest suburban standards, closer than Frankfort, Manhattan or Channahon, and it is a large part of what the prices reflect.

If a train is non negotiable for you, thinking about Orland Park, IL is a more honest place to start, and it is still Cook County.

What makes Lemont's parks and downtown stand out?

Two different agencies run the outdoor assets here, and the distinction matters if you are comparing towns.

The Lemont Park District operates roughly 25 parks across more than 160 acres, plus The CORE Fitness and Aquatic Complex, which carries a six lane indoor pool, a three court gymnasium, a fitness center and an indoor track. An indoor facility of that size is not common in a town this size and it is the reason the parks rating lands where it does.

Separately, the Village of Lemont operates the Heritage Quarries Recreation Area, where about six miles of crushed stone trail run along the I and M Canal with a trailhead right downtown. That is the village, not the park district. Two budgets, two agencies, one town.

The downtown itself is the thing people actually fall for. It sits on a bluff above the canal, and it is a genuine walkable district rather than a strip with sidewalks. Pollyanna Brewing is based here, and Pollyanna Social, its cocktail bar at 326 E Main Street, sits about a block away. Wooden Paddle on Stephen Street, the wood fired pizza place the Cowan family opened in 2013, is the only real style outlier in the region. Folklore Coffee opens at 6:30 in the morning, the earliest opening independent coffee shop across the nineteen towns I checked, and Neima Coffee on Front Street runs to about nine at night.

Worth knowing before you picture it wrong: Lemont has a second restaurant cluster that is nothing like the first. 3 Corners Grill & Tap and Rosebud Lemont sit across from each other on Derby Road, a couple of miles from downtown out toward the interstate. Both are well regarded and neither is walkable from Main Street. If somebody tells you Lemont has great restaurants, ask which end of town they mean.

There is also The Forge: Lemont Quarries, an outdoor adventure park inside the village, which is not something any of Lemont's neighbors can say.

Is Lemont a good place to buy for the next 5 to 10 years?

The fundamentals are steady rather than explosive, and for a town at this price point that is probably the right shape.

Population went from 16,000 in 2010 to 17,629 in 2020, and the 2025 estimate is 18,513. That is roughly 16 percent over fifteen years, which is growth without the strain that comes from a town doubling. Median household income is about $123,370 and the homeownership rate is 87.6 percent, which is high and tends to mean stable turnover rather than churn.

The median home was built around 1995, so the housing stock is neither historic nor brand new across most of the village, whatever the downtown looks like. Two new construction communities are actively selling, Gleneagles from Pulte and the Estates of Montefiori from Lakeview Homes.

The honest watch item is supply. Inventory is up more than fifty percent over twelve months while the expensive end sits. If you are buying at the top of this market, budget for the possibility that the next reassessment catches up to what you paid, and do not count on the last two years of appreciation repeating.

How I rate Lemont

A one star train rating with a station in town looks like a mistake, so here is the arithmetic. Three inbound trains leave Lemont in the morning, the last at 7:26. Three come home, the last leaving Union Station at 5:30. Nothing midday, nothing on weekends.

On walkability: Walk Score publishes no single number for Lemont, so here is what it does publish. Downtown scores 76, which is genuinely walkable. Covington Knolls scores 27. Woodglen Lane scores 8. Most of Lemont's housing looks like the second two, not the first, and two stars is the town rather than its best block.

Every one of those thresholds is published, so you can check my work and disagree with it. Here is what each star actually means, including the categories that rest on judgment rather than data, and the one thing I will not rate.

The Bottom Line

Lemont is the most expensive town I cover and it earns most of it. The schools are genuinely Exemplary, the tax rate is the lowest in the region, the downtown is the real thing rather than a marketing line, and you are twenty eight miles from the Loop.

What you are buying against is the train and the car dependence. Three trains a day and nothing on weekends means the station does not solve your commute unless your hours are unusually cooperative, and outside the downtown blocks this is a place you drive everywhere in. If that is fine with you, very little else about Lemont is going to disappoint.

The three things I would actually do before writing an offer: confirm which county the parcel is in and whether it is inside village limits, confirm the high school district actually serves it, since District 210 does not reach into Will County, and pull the property's real tax history instead of trusting the number on the listing, especially in a reassessment year.

Last updated: September 2026.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Lemont a good place to live?

For most people who can afford it, yes. It has an Exemplary rated high school district, the lowest property tax rate in the area, a walkable historic downtown, and it is closer to Chicago than most of its neighbors. The catch is transit: three weekday trains and no weekend service.

How much does a house cost in Lemont?

The median single family home sold for $807,000 in August 2026, with active listings asking a median of $795,000. The median value across all owner occupied homes in town is closer to $468,800, because what sells in a given month skews newer and larger than the town as a whole.

What are property taxes like in Lemont?

The median effective rate is about 1.93 percent, the lowest in the area, with a median annual bill near $8,680. The low rate does not make the bill low, because Lemont's houses are expensive. Nearby Orland Park has a higher rate and a lower bill.

How long is the commute from Lemont to Chicago?

By car it is about 28 driving miles to the Loop on I-55, with I-355 running through the village. I am not going to publish a drive time, because it depends entirely on when you leave. By train the published schedule runs 46 to 47 minutes from Lemont to Union Station, but only three trains go inbound each weekday and there is no weekend service.

How are the schools in Lemont?

Lemont Township High School District 210 earned an Exemplary summative designation on the 2024 report card, with proficiency well above the state in English, math and science. Elementary and middle grades are Lemont-Bromberek District 113A. Check illinoisreportcard.com for the current year.

Is Lemont in Cook County or Will County?

The Village of Lemont is almost entirely in Cook County. Of 6,773 housing units in the village at the 2020 census, 6,770 were in Cook. However, the Lemont mailing address extends into unincorporated Will and DuPage County, so a property with a Lemont address is not necessarily in the village or in Cook. Verify the parcel before you offer.

When was Lemont last reassessed?

Lemont Township was reassessed in 2026. Cook County runs a three year cycle by region, so the previous reassessments were 2023 and 2020, and the next one is 2029. In a reassessment year the notices go out in mid August and the appeal window closes at the end of September, but check the Assessor's calendar for the exact dates rather than an article.

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Set up a time to talk if you want the real tax math on a specific Lemont address before you make an offer on it.

Brian Wittman | Blue Jean Broker
Real Estate | Mortgage | Life Insurance | Financial Literacy
Based in Manhattan, IL | Serving the Chicago Suburbs

Brian Wittman is a licensed real estate broker (Real Broker LLC), mortgage loan originator (NMLS #2646598, NEXA Mortgage, LLC, Equal Housing Lender), and life insurance producer (Levinson & Associates). This article is for educational purposes only and is not financial, lending, tax, or legal advice, an offer, or a commitment to lend; all loans are subject to credit approval. Information is accurate as of the publication date; for current details and full disclosures, visit https://bluejeanbroker.com/disclosures.