Counties / Georgia / Toombs County

Toombs County, GA

FIPS 13279 · population 27,102 · part of Vidalia, GA

$176k
Zillow home value · 2026-06
The numbers

What this county costs and earns

Everything here joins on the county FIPS code, so each figure comes from the agency that publishes it with no name matching in between.

Zillow home value
$176k
▲ 3.9% year over year
Zillow ZHVI · direct
Median asking rent
$1,133
n/a year over year
Zillow ZORI · direct
Gross yield
7.7%
annual rent ÷ price, before costs
derived: rent × 12 ÷ price ✓
HUD 2-bed standard
$973
market rent is 1.16x the standard
HUD Fair Market Rent · direct
Independent price check

Do two methods point the same way?

Zillow estimates a current home value. FHFA tracks repeat mortgage transactions. Their growth rates should be read side by side, not averaged.

The annual signals disagree
FHFA five-year cumulative+52.9%not annualized · through 2025
0%ZILLOW ZHVI2026-06+3.9%FHFA HPI2025−1.3%
Annual changes use different methods and may use different periods. The comparison checks direction and magnitude; it does not create a blended estimate. Zillow county ZHVI pulled 2026-07-26; FHFA annual county HPI pulled 2026-07-28.
Owner-reported value$137k
Surveyed gross rent$768
Rent burden 30%+42.7%
Median year built1984
Housing composition

Who occupies the stock—and what it is

ACS 2024 5-year
14.0%vacant
12,103estimated housing units
Occupied tenure39.5% renter
owner 60.5%renter 39.5%
Structure mix59.2% single-family
Single-family 59.2%20+ units 1.1%Mobile home 26.2%Other 13.5%
ACS estimates describe the standing housing stock and occupied tenure. They do not measure current listings, transaction prices or asking rents.

Survey source: Census ACS 5-year — county housing value, tenure and stock · ACS 2024 5-year · pulled 2026-07-30. These values describe different housing universes and are not combined into gross yield.

Annual average covered jobs11,968▼ 2.5% from the prior annual release
Covered establishments786annual average reporting locations
Average weekly wage$897▲ 1.4% from the prior annual release
Largest private supersectorTrade, transportation, and utilities23.8% of disclosed private covered jobs
Local labor base

Jobs, pay and private-sector concentration

2025
0%COVERED JOBS−2.5%WEEKLY WAGE+1.4%Trade, transportation, and utilities23.8%
Annual QCEW counts cover jobs located at reporting establishments. The industry share uses disclosed private covered employment; it is not a resident-employment measure or a forecast.

Workplace source: BLS QCEW — county employment and wages · annual county employment and wages 2025 vs 2024 · pulled 2026-07-31. QCEW counts covered jobs located in the county, not employed residents or the metro score’s CES/LAUS series.

County brief

What the local evidence says

01Decision frame

Toombs County has an income-versus-liquidity tension: published yield is measurable, but the record does not establish resilient resale or employment conditions. Income-oriented underwriting merits investigation; buyers dependent on appreciation or a quick resale warrant caution. At Zillow’s county 2026-06 observation, median home value was $175,688 and measured median asking rent was $1,133 monthly, producing the supplied 7.74% gross yield before costs. HUD’s two-bedroom FMR is a payment standard, not asking rent, and is not used to infer yield. The effective property-tax rate was 0.90%; insurance, maintenance, vacancy, financing and other expenses are not published, preventing net-yield calculation.

02Housing economics

FHFA’s annual 2025 repeat-transaction HPI declined 1.30%. It is an index, not a dollar home value; it challenges Zillow’s differently dated upward direction and cannot be averaged with Zillow into one growth rate. QCEW reports that annual covered employment at county workplaces fell 2.55%, rather than measuring resident employment or unemployment. Its average weekly wage is a covered-worker average; Trade, transportation, and utilities is the largest disclosed private supersector, not the whole economy.

03Demand & competition

Realtor.com’s MLS listing market shows active listings up 67.78%, a median 63 days on market, and reported price reductions. These are asking-price, visible-supply, marketing-time and seller-concession evidence, not closed sales or standalone proof of buyer demand. Tax-return migration was a calculated net gain of 20 households, while average income of incoming moving households was only $200 higher. Investors accounted for 4 of 122 purchase mortgages, or 3.28%, a limited measured mortgage-participation footprint.

04Risk & next checks

Inland flood is the dominant hazard. The modeled annual climate loss ratio is 0.11% of building value; it is not a parcel loss estimate and cannot be converted into dollars from this record. Missing flood-zone, elevation, claims, insurance-quote, condition, operating-expense, closed-sale and financing evidence prevents property-level cash-flow, hazard and exit-value underwriting. County aggregates also cannot establish neighborhood outcomes.

Cities & communities

Where people live within Toombs County

Census-recognized incorporated places and CDPs that intersect this county. The list does not pretend to include every neighborhood or informal community.

Population scale

Largest Census places

ACS 2024 5-year
Vidalia city*10.8KLyons city4.2KSanta Claus city169Ohoopee CDP5
Bars use total place population, not a county-share estimate. An asterisk marks a place that crosses a county line.
Official directory

4 Census places

Population
  1. 01
    Vidalia cityIncorporated place · spans 2 counties
    10,752
  2. 02
    Lyons cityIncorporated place
    4,219
  3. 03
    Santa Claus cityIncorporated place
    169
  4. 04
    Ohoopee CDPCensus-designated place
    5

Population is the total place-wide ACS estimate, not an allocated county share. A place crossing a county line is labelled explicitly. Source: Census ACS 5-year — cities and communities · ACS 2024 5-year · pulled 2026-07-30.

Risk, demand and competition

The three things a price does not tell you

01
Risk & carrying costFEMA NRI + Census ACS
Dominant hazardinland flooding

0.109% of building value expected lost per year

Effective property tax0.90%

$1,235 median annual bill

02
DemandIRS SOI household flows
Net migration+20

610 in · 590 out

Arriving vs leaving income+$200

$40,841 arriving · $40,641 leaving

03
CompetitionHMDA financed purchases
Purchases by investors3.3%

4 of 122 mortgages

investorother financed
Current listing pressure

What sellers and visible supply are doing

Realtor.com® Economic Research · county inventory 2026-06 · pulled 2026-07-28
Active listings76▲ 67.8% year over year
Median days on market63▲ 10.6% year over year
Listings price-reduced15.6%seller-concession signal
Median listing pricen/a▲ 1.3% year over year

Listing price is an asking price, not a closed sale. Quality-flagged county rows are withheld instead of displayed.

Same metro

The other counties in Vidalia, GA

A metro is an average of these. Which side of a county line a property sits on can change the tax bill, the hazard profile and the tenant pool.

CountyPopulationPriceRentYieldHazard
Toombs County27,102$176k$1,1337.7%inland flooding
Montgomery County8,640$178kn/an/ainland flooding
Bear case

What can break the county thesis

  1. Unpublished operating and insurance costs could eliminate the apparent gross-return advantage.
  2. County-level migration and workplace employment data may not reflect a property's tenant base.
  3. Parcel-specific inland-flood exposure could differ materially from the county modeled loss ratio.
Underwriting questions

Before pricing a property

Does the record provide a market-rent measure suitable for the gross-yield calculation?

Yes. It labels rent as median asking rent and separately identifies HUD FMR as a payment standard.

Do the Realtor.com figures establish closed-sale pricing or buyer demand?

No. They are MLS listing-market measures of asking prices, visible inventory, marketing time, reductions and pendings.

How broad is measured investor mortgage participation?

The record shows investor mortgages as a small portion of purchase mortgages, not as a measure of all-cash purchases or every investor activity.