Rent, home values, family budgets, pay and taxes for the Columbia metro area, county by county.
Across the 6 counties in the metro with their own Zillow home value, the median typical home is worth $231,603. Values changed +2.4% over the past year and +22.6% over five years at the median county. A typical home costs 2.98 years of median family income at the median county.
With 10% down at 7.03%, the average 30-year rate on September 24, 2026, that home costs about $1,875 a month with tax, insurance and mortgage insurance, which takes $80,367 a year of income under the usual 28% guideline. The median family can afford its own county's typical home in 1 of the 6 counties, against 44.9% of counties nationally. Try it with your own income.
The most expensive counties in the metro are Lexington County ($274,819), Kershaw County ($259,845) and Richland County ($245,186); the least expensive are Fairfield County ($188,084), Calhoun County ($209,975) and Saluda County ($218,019).
The Economic Policy Institute prices what a modest but adequate standard of living costs in every county. In the median county of the metro, that comes to $47,454 a year for one adult and $97,474 for two adults and two children, of which $15,883 is childcare, against national averages of $47,367 and $101,771. Median family income is $77,325 in the median county.
Prices across South Carolina as a whole run 6.3% below the national average and rents 19.5% below the national average, by the Bureau of Economic Analysis's state measure. Median pay across all jobs in the state is $46,490 a year. South Carolina's top income tax rate on wages is 5.21%. These are statewide figures, not measured for the metro itself. The metro lies within South Carolina. Compare a salary with another state or work out take-home pay.
| Calhoun County | $209,975 | +3.5% | — | $76,938 | $97,860 |
| Fairfield County | $188,084 | +2.1% | $1,906 | $65,224 | $97,087 |
| Kershaw County | $259,845 | +2.9% | $1,927 | $77,712 | $92,311 |
| Lexington County | $274,819 | +1.4% | $1,689 | $89,968 | $105,752 |
| Richland County | $245,186 | +1.2% | $1,510 | $84,362 | $105,508 |
| Saluda County | $218,019 | +2.6% | — | $66,953 | $94,442 |
A dash means the source publishes no figure for that county. Metro membership follows Zillow's own county-to-metro assignment.
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Cost of living · Income tax · Child care costs
Metro areasGreenville, SC · Columbia, SC · Charleston, SC
Run the numbersTake-home pay in South Carolina · What a salary is worth in South Carolina · How much rent you can afford · What a car costs in South Carolina
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