Buying a Home in the Metro East, IL: Belleville, O'Fallon, Edwardsville, Alton, the Towns Around Scott Air Force Base and the River Counties

"Up on the bluff" and "down in the bottoms" are directions on the Illinois side of St. Louis. The bluff is a wall of limestone and dolomite about 80 miles long and 200 to 300 feet tall. The bottoms are the American Bottom, about 175 square miles of Mississippi River floodplain from Alton south to the Kaskaskia River (Wikipedia: American Bottom). Down in the bottoms, 147 steps climb Monks Mound at Cahokia Mounds, the largest earthen mound north of Mexico (Cahokia Mounds). Up on the bluff, Belleville has had a public library since 1836, the oldest in Illinois, started with help from Gustav Koerner. Twelve years later the town took in the educated German refugees of the failed 1848 revolution and called them its "Latin Farmers" (Wikipedia: Belleville, Illinois). And at the far northwest corner of the metro, the Brussels Ferry crosses the Illinois River for free into Calhoun County, a county of 4,224 people, seven orchards and exactly one bridge.

The Metro East is the Illinois side of St. Louis, and most of its people live in St. Clair County, around Belleville, O'Fallon and Scott Air Force Base, or in Madison County, around Edwardsville, Collinsville and Alton. I'm Jeff Moran, NMLS #483943, a mortgage broker licensed in Illinois and in Missouri through C2 Financial Corporation, and I have been in the mortgage business since 1996. I work out of Bluffton, South Carolina, and I wrote this page for you if you are thinking about buying a home on the Illinois side of St. Louis. This is one housing market split by the Mississippi River, and I cover the Missouri side on the St. Louis page. The places come first below, and after them the Illinois-only things worth looking up on any address before you compare it with another one. The facts come from public sources, gathered in late September 2026.

Scott Air Force Base, and the towns around it

Scott Air Force Base is in unincorporated St. Clair County and is home to U.S. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM). The Leadership Council Southwestern Illinois calls it the largest employer in Southwestern Illinois (Leadership Council Southwestern Illinois). The base shows up in the lending numbers too. In 2024, 1,268 of the 8,272 home purchase loans on the Illinois side of St. Louis were VA loans, about 15%, the highest VA share of any Illinois metro (Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data, 2024). If you are moving here on orders, how VA loans work in Illinois covers your entitlement, the funding fee and why Illinois is on VA's list of states where a veteran can be charged for the attorney.

Mascoutah and the base housing areas

Mascoutah is home to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport and to Mascoutah Community Unit School District 19, which serves the city and the unincorporated county around it, the base included (Wikipedia: Mascoutah CUSD 19). If your orders put you in base housing, Scott Elementary School is next to the base. It serves pre-K through fifth grade from the Patriot's Landing, Lincoln's Landing, Shiloh East, Shiloh West, Galaxy and Brick Quarters housing areas (Mascoutah School District 19). If you buy off base instead, the district's own boundary map tells you which school serves the address, and that is worth looking up before you get attached to a particular home.

O'Fallon and Shiloh

O'Fallon describes itself as the fastest-growing community in the Metro East, with 32,289 people at the 2020 census (City of O'Fallon). If you want new construction near the base, Lombardo Homes plans Brandywine Garden Villas, 174 attached homes at the northeast corner of South Lincoln Avenue and I-64, and the city council has approved it (KSDK). Shiloh-Scott, in Shiloh, is the MetroLink station that serves the base, and until the airport extension opens it is the east end of the line (Wikipedia: Shiloh-Scott station).

Belleville

Belleville is the St. Clair County seat and the largest city in the Metro East, with 42,404 people (Wikipedia: Metro East). The Belleville Historic District has been on the National Register since 1976, with more than 700 properties inside it (Digital Research Library of Illinois History Journal). If the home you like is inside the district, please ask the city what review applies to exterior changes before you plan a project, because I have not found that ordinance published.

Edwardsville, Glen Carbon, Collinsville, Troy and Granite City

Edwardsville

SIUE finished a $117.4 million Health Sciences Complex this year, and it gives the School of Pharmacy its first permanent building since the school was founded in 2004 (STLPR, April 28, 2026). Edwardsville is also where the metro's warehouses are: the St. Louis Regional Freightway counts nearly 50 of them across Gateway Commerce Center, Lakeview Commerce Center and Gateway TradePort (St. Louis Regional Freightway, February 2026). If your job is in one of those buildings, I would drive the commute from any home you are considering at the hour you would actually leave.

Cloverleaf Infrastructure discussed a data center site off New Poag Road, near SIUE's outdoor recreation fields, with city and county officials for about a year (Illinois Answers Project, February 21, 2026). If you are looking at a home near that site, the city council agenda is where a formal proposal would show up first.

Glen Carbon

Destination Illinois LLC proposes a $1.97 billion entertainment and mixed-use district on 1,500 acres near the I-270 and I-255 interchange, funded through STAR bonds. STAR stands for sales tax and revenue, and the idea is that the money borrowed to build the district gets paid back out of the sales tax the district itself generates. The village trustees voted to set the district's boundaries, state approval is still required, and nothing has been built (STLPR, February 27, 2026). If you are buying near that interchange, it is a proposal today and nothing more, and that is how I would weigh it.

Collinsville

Collinsville calls itself the Horseradish Capital of the World (Great Rivers & Routes), Ameren Illinois is headquartered here (Collinsville Chamber), and Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site is inside the city. Its museum reopened in 2026 after four years of repairs (STLPR, June 10, 2026). The city straddles the Madison and St. Clair county line, so if you are looking here, the county the home is in decides which assessor you deal with and which year its reassessment comes up. That is the first thing I would look up on a Collinsville parcel.

Troy, St. Jacob and Marine

Triad Community Unit School District 2 broke ground on a new Triad Middle School on October 13, 2025, with an opening scheduled for July 2027 (Troy Times Tribune, July 30, 2026). It is the one new school building under construction that I found in the metro. If you have a child who will be in middle school in the fall of 2027, that is the building they would walk into.

Granite City

U.S. Steel's Granite City Works halted production in fall 2025, with 800 jobs protected until 2027 under the Nippon Steel arrangement (Manufacturing Dive). In late March 2026 the company restarted one of the mill's two blast furnaces and hired about 400 workers (STLPR, March 27, 2026). If your income comes from the mill, please let me know early. A stop and a restart in your work history is something underwriting looks at when it decides whether your income will continue.

The Riverbend: Alton, East Alton, Wood River and Roxana

The business association calls this stretch of Madison County the Riverbend (RiverBend Growth Association). Alton is running its first comprehensive plan update in 30 years (The Telegraph). That plan is where the city writes down what it wants each part of town to become, so it is worth reading before you choose an Alton neighborhood. In East Alton, Wieland Rolled Products is spending $500 million to re-equip and expand its copper mill. The project broke ground in April 2025, keeps 800 Illinois jobs in place and is expected to add about 80 permanent jobs when it finishes (Illinois Governor's office). Olin's Winchester plant is in East Alton too (Wikipedia: Olin Corporation), and the Wood River Refinery, in Roxana, is run by Phillips 66 (Phillips 66). If your job is at the copper mill, the refinery or the Winchester plant, your pay stubs show your base pay and your overtime on separate lines, and underwriting looks at those two lines differently. Please provide your most recent 30 days of pay stubs, all pages, please, so the base pay and overtime lines can be looked at separately and we qualify you on the right number.

The river counties: Monroe, Jersey, Calhoun, Clinton, Macoupin and Bond

Monroe County: Waterloo, Columbia and the Sinkhole Plain

Waterloo is the county seat, with 11,013 people at the 2020 census (Wikipedia: Waterloo, Illinois). South and east of the bluff line between the American Bottom and the prairie above it, Monroe and St. Clair counties are on the Illinois Sinkhole Plain. The ground there is karst, which is limestone that water has slowly hollowed out, and the Illinois State Geological Survey has mapped more than 15,000 sinkholes in it. Many of them stay open and carry surface runoff straight down into the groundwater (Illinois State Geological Survey). Monroe County publishes an interactive sinkhole map, and if you are looking at a home or land out here, it is worth opening for any parcel you are serious about. I come back to the well and the septic system in the homework section.

Jersey County: Jerseyville, Grafton and Elsah

Grafton is on Illinois 100, the Great River Road National Scenic Byway, below Pere Marquette State Park (Jersey County). If a river town is what you are after, Grafton and Elsah are the two on this stretch, and Jerseyville, the county seat, is inland.

Calhoun County: two ferries and one bridge

Calhoun County is a narrow peninsula between the Illinois and Mississippi rivers (Great Rivers & Routes). You reach it by the Brussels Ferry just north of Grafton or the Kampsville Ferry, both free and run by the Illinois Department of Transportation, or by the Joe Page Bridge at Hardin, the county's only bridge (Great River Road). With 4,224 people it is the smallest county in the metro by a wide margin, and anyone you hire who is not already on the peninsula comes in by ferry or over that one bridge. If you buy here, I would build time for the appraisal and the survey into your contract dates, with the ferry schedule next to them.

Clinton County: Carlyle Lake

Carlyle Lake is the largest lake wholly inside Illinois, more than 26,000 acres of land and water, mostly in Clinton County (Wikipedia: Carlyle Lake). If a lake home is the plan, the flood map question in the homework section applies out here too, and it is worth asking about the parcel early.

Macoupin County: Carlinville's Sears homes

In 1918 Standard Oil of Indiana ordered 192 Honor-Bilt kit homes from Sears, Roebuck for its coal miners, and 156 of them went to Carlinville. Today 152 still stand in the Standard Addition, the largest concentrated collection of Sears catalog homes in the world (Carlinville Public Library). If you fall for one of those 1918 homes, its age shows up in the appraisal and the inspection, and I would rather talk that through with you before you write an offer than after.

Bond County: Greenville

Greenville is the county seat and home to Greenville University, just off I-70 (Wikipedia: Greenville, Illinois). I found no 2026 development news for Bond County, so if you are buying here, city hall and the county offices are the places to ask what is planned near the address.

East St. Louis and Cahokia Heights: what is being built and repaired

In downtown East St. Louis, Winstanley Park is a $13 million development of 38 apartments and townhomes, all of them spoken for. It is part of a master plan for more than 220 new homes and a repair fund for existing owners (STLPR, September 15, 2025).

In Cahokia Heights, a federal court entered a consent decree on January 20, 2026 over the city's sanitary sewer system. A consent decree is a court-approved agreement the city has to carry out, and this one calls for an estimated $30 million of work (U.S. EPA; Illinois Attorney General, January 23, 2026). That includes more than 80 sewer line and pump station projects by the end of 2026 and a new main sewer line by the end of 2028. It also includes repairing or replacing the pipe that runs from a home to the sewer main, at no cost to the owner, for at least 100 eligible properties by December 31, 2026. The EPA stated in court documents that flooding itself was outside its enforcement jurisdiction in this case. So on a home there, the decree covers the sewer, and the flood map is a separate question to ask about the specific address.

Roads, MetroLink and MidAmerica Airport

IDOT counted 23 major projects in the Metro East this construction season (Troy Times Tribune, June 29, 2026). These are the ones I would want you to know about.

The I-270 bridge over the Mississippi. If you will drive between Madison County and north St. Louis County, this is your bridge. Replacement began in 2022 and is expected to be complete in 2027, with night lane closures along the way (IDOT).

MetroLink to MidAmerica Airport. The 5.2-mile extension from Shiloh-Scott to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport has been under construction since 2023, and safety testing was under way in mid-2026 (St. Clair County Transit District; First Alert 4, June 28, 2026). Once it opens, MetroLink runs airport to airport, about 43 miles from Lambert to MidAmerica (Wikipedia: MidAmerica St. Louis Airport station). I could not confirm an opening date when I wrote this, so the St. Clair County Transit District is the place to confirm trains are running before you count on it for a commute.

MidAmerica St. Louis Airport (BLV). The airport in Mascoutah shares its airfield with the base, Allegiant is its commercial carrier, and it set a record of 192,000 boardings in 2025 (flymidamerica.com). If you fly often, a home in Mascoutah, Shiloh or O'Fallon puts this airport close by, and whether that helps you comes down to where Allegiant flies from it.

Schools and hospitals: the buildings

A Metro East address falls in one of a long list of school districts. The ones that came up in my research are Mascoutah CUSD 19, Triad CUSD 2, Edwardsville CUSD 7, Highland CUSD 5, Belleville Township High School District 201 and Columbia CUSD 4. O'Fallon has CCSD 90 for pre-K through eighth grade, with O'Fallon Township High School District 203 above it, and Freeburg has a separate elementary district and high school district. The district's own boundary map is the place to confirm which one serves a specific address, and I would do that before you write an offer rather than after.

Memorial Hospital Shiloh, a BJC hospital with a 24-hour emergency department, is the hospital nearest the base (BJC), Anderson Hospital is in Maryville, and HSHS St. Elizabeth's Hospital is in O'Fallon. If you are comparing two addresses, the drive to the emergency room is the one to measure.

Mine subsidence, flood maps, property tax and the survey: the homework on any Metro East address

These are the things I would check with you on any address here before you compare it with another one, and most of them take a phone call or a web page.

Mine subsidence coverage

Mine subsidence is the ground sinking over an abandoned underground coal mine, and a good part of the northern Metro East is over old mines. In the 34 Illinois counties where most underground mining happened, state law requires mine subsidence coverage to be included in a residential insurance policy. Madison, St. Clair and Macoupin are three of them, so in those counties the coverage is in your policy automatically. You can reject it in writing, and it cannot exceed $750,000 (Illinois Mine Subsidence Insurance Fund). House Bill 5376 was signed into law this year, and for policies issued or renewed on or after January 1, 2027 there is no deductible on mine subsidence damage (Illinois House Democrats, July 1, 2026). For the other five Metro East counties, Clinton, Monroe, Jersey, Bond and Calhoun, I have not confirmed whether the coverage comes automatically. Please check the Fund's county list at the link above or ask your insurance agent.

Flood maps and the levees

About 65 miles of levee protect the American Bottom across Madison, St. Clair and Monroe counties (Southwestern Illinois Flood Prevention District Council). Accreditation is FEMA's finding that a levee can hold a flood with a 1% chance in any year, and it decides how the homes behind the levee are mapped. FEMA issued its final letter of accreditation for the Metro East Sanitary District levees on April 26, 2022. Losing that accreditation had been reported as costing American Bottom homes and businesses about $50 million a year in flood insurance (STLPR, May 2, 2022).

FEMA released preliminary new flood maps for St. Clair, Madison and Monroe counties in 2023 to replace maps that dated from 2003 (STLPR, January 30, 2023). Please look up the specific address on FEMA's Map Service Center for the map in effect today, because a map change moves homes into and out of required flood insurance. If the home is in FEMA's high-risk flood area, the lender will require flood insurance, and that premium becomes part of your monthly payment. I explain how to price it in before you make an offer in buying a home in a flood zone.

Sinkholes, wells and septic

Illinois has no statewide inspection requirement for a private well or septic system, though a seller must still disclose known problems (University of Illinois Extension). So in unincorporated Monroe, Clinton, Bond, Jersey, Macoupin and Calhoun counties, you line up the well and septic inspection yourself, and I would get it scheduled early, inside the inspection period your contract gives you. On the Sinkhole Plain, open sinkholes carry surface water straight into the groundwater a well draws from, and a septic system drains into that same hollowed-out limestone. So on a parcel there, I would have the septic system inspected and the parcel checked against Monroe County's sinkhole map, and I would want to see both before you write an offer.

Earthquake coverage

The New Madrid Seismic Zone runs through southern Illinois, and USGS estimates a 7% to 10% chance of a magnitude 7.5 or larger earthquake there over 50 years (Illinois Insurance Association). A standard homeowners policy does not cover earthquake damage, so you buy it as an endorsement or a separate policy. The deductible is a percentage of the dwelling limit, commonly 2% to 15%, rather than a flat dollar amount (Illinois Insurance Association). The figures below are made up, to show the arithmetic:

Dwelling limit (invented)         $300,000
Earthquake deductible            x     10%
                                  --------
You cover first                    $30,000

Property tax: the four-year cycle and the homestead exemption

Outside Cook County, Illinois counties reassess every parcel on a four-year cycle, called the quadrennial reassessment, with the whole county done in the same year (Caton Commercial). Each county posts its schedule, and the assessor can tell you which year the township you are buying in comes up. If you buy in a reassessment year, the figure on the seller's last bill is about to move.

EAV is the equalized assessed value, the figure the tax rate is applied to. The General Homestead Exemption takes up to $6,000 of EAV off an owner-occupied home in all eight Metro East counties for 2026. The Senior Homestead Exemption takes another $5,000 off at age 65 and up (Illinois CPA Society, Spring 2026). There is also a low-income senior freeze, and its income limit is set each year, so please confirm the current figure with the county. The seller's exemptions come off the bill when the home sells, and you would apply for your own, so the seller's last bill is a starting point rather than your number.

Transfer tax, attorney review and the survey

The State of Illinois charges a transfer tax on a sale, and a county may add up to $0.25 per $500 of the price. A city with home-rule powers, which in Illinois means the state lets it set more of its own local taxes, may add its own on top. The tax is paid through revenue stamps from the county recorder, and by custom the seller pays, though it is negotiable (Illinois Department of Revenue). Please ask your attorney which municipal transfer tax, if any, applies to the address and who pays it, because I have not found a published list for the Metro East cities.

Most Illinois residential contracts carry a five-business-day attorney review period. The standard Multi-Board Residential Real Estate Contract 7.0 has the seller provide a staked boundary survey, and your attorney reviews it (Illinois State Bar Association; O'Flaherty Law). That survey shows you where the lot lines are, where any easements run and whether a fence, a shed or a driveway crosses a line. It tells you nothing about old mines or sinkholes under the lot, so for those you use the Mine Subsidence Insurance Fund's risk pages and Monroe County's sinkhole map instead. The Illinois page covers the lawyers-and-a-title-company closing in full.

Two more Illinois documents reach you before or at contract. Under the Illinois Radon Awareness Act, the seller gives you the state radon pamphlet and the Disclosure of Information on Radon Hazards form before the contract is signed. Nothing in the Act requires anyone to test or fix the home (Illinois Emergency Management Agency). On a condo or a home in an association, Section 22.1 of the Illinois Condominium Property Act gives you a disclosure of the current assessment, any special assessments levied or being considered, and the governing documents. The association has 10 business days to produce it (KSN Law). The dues figure in that disclosure is the one I put into your monthly payment when we work out what you qualify for.

Your mortgage payment and your cash to close in the Metro East

All eight counties carry the same 2026 loan limits, and they are in the box below this article: the conforming limit, which is the largest loan Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will buy, and the FHA limit. Property tax, the homeowners policy with its mine subsidence coverage, flood premiums where they apply, and any association assessment all go into the monthly payment we qualify you on. Earthquake coverage is optional, so it counts only if you choose it and it is paid through escrow. The transfer tax, if it lands on you, and the attorney's fee are part of your cash to close instead. Pre-approval in Illinois covers what the letter is based on.

You can run your numbers whenever you are ready: rates for your scenario and Illinois closing costs, with no credit pull and no account. Choose the option that works best for you, and the application opens from there.

Nothing here is a loan approval, a denial or a commitment to lend, and it is not tax advice. The assessment and the exemptions on a specific parcel are set by that county's assessor, so please confirm them with the county office.

Common questions

Is the Metro East in Illinois or Missouri?

Illinois. The Metro East is the Illinois side of the St. Louis metro, and the Mississippi River is the state line. Madison and St. Clair are its two largest counties, with Macoupin, Clinton, Monroe, Jersey, Bond and Calhoun around them.

Which towns are near Scott Air Force Base?

The base is in unincorporated St. Clair County next to Mascoutah, and Shiloh, O'Fallon, Belleville and Fairview Heights are the closest towns. Mascoutah Community Unit School District 19 serves the base, and Shiloh-Scott is the MetroLink station for it.

Do I need mine subsidence insurance in Illinois?

In Madison, St. Clair and Macoupin counties the coverage is included in a residential insurance policy by state law, and you can reject it in writing. For policies issued or renewed on or after January 1, 2027, House Bill 5376 removes the deductible on mine subsidence damage. For the other five Metro East counties, the Illinois Mine Subsidence Insurance Fund's county list says whether the coverage is automatic.

Is the MetroLink extension to MidAmerica Airport open?

I could not confirm it when I wrote this. The 5.2-mile extension from Shiloh-Scott to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport was in safety testing in mid-2026, and the St. Clair County Transit District is the place to confirm whether it has opened.

Should I buy on the Illinois side or the Missouri side of St. Louis?

Both sides are one housing market, and I am licensed on both. The differences are in the law and the paperwork: Illinois has a five-business-day attorney review period, a seller-provided staked boundary survey, transfer stamps and mine subsidence coverage built into policies in several counties. The St. Louis page walks through the Missouri side.

When is my home reassessed in Madison County or St. Clair County?

Outside Cook County, Illinois reassesses every parcel on a four-year cycle, with the whole county done in the same year. Each county assessor publishes the schedule, so please ask the assessor which year applies to the township your home is in.

How do you get to Calhoun County?

By the Brussels Ferry just north of Grafton, by the Kampsville Ferry, or by the Joe Page Bridge at Hardin. Both ferries are free and run by the Illinois Department of Transportation, and the bridge is the county's only one.