Rent vs Own in Stonewall County, Texas

What This Data Tells Us About Renting vs Owning in Stonewall County

The median home value in Stonewall County, Texas is $48,600 with a median annual property tax of $872 - an effective rate of 1.79% on the underlying value. At 20% down and a 6.5% 30-year mortgage, the estimated monthly ownership cost (mortgage plus property tax plus insurance) comes to $333, versus $1,015/mo for a HUD Fair Market Rent 2-bedroom unit in the same county. On those assumptions, owning is about $682/mo cheaper than renting before accounting for maintenance, HOA fees, or closing costs.

The median household income in Stonewall County is $56,875, which puts the home-price-to-income ratio at roughly 0.9x, a common affordability yardstick flags ratios above 5x as stretched. Property taxes alone consume 1.5% of median income, versus a 2%–4% national benchmark. These are median-household snapshots, not personalized numbers, your own rent-versus-own math depends on down payment, credit, mortgage rate, how long you plan to stay, and whether you itemize the property tax deduction on your federal return.

Stonewall County's 1.79% effective property tax rate ranks among the highest of the 3,135 counties in this dataset -- only about 95% of tracked counties pay more. That tax line carries real weight in the ownership total above, and is worth factoring in separately from the mortgage payment itself when weighing buying against renting here.

HUD's 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent estimate for Stonewall County changed from $976/mo in FY2025 to $1,015/mo in FY2026: it increased by $39/mo (+4.0%) year over year. That is in line with the modest single-digit annual FMR adjustment HUD applies in most counties.

Using the assumptions above, Stonewall County ranks 2 of 250 Texas counties for buy-vs-rent value (rank 1 = best relative deal for buying). It sits ahead of 248 other Texas counties on this measure.