It was just last week that the 7th annual survey from SmartAssett.com listed Hoopeston as the third most affordable small city to live in in the state of Illinois. Factors ranked include annual homeowner’s insurance, average annual mortgage payment, and median income. Bill Crusinberry has been Hoopeston’s mayor for 12 years. He says if you look back to the 90s, it was a rough time with everyone from Hoopeston to Danville losing industries and losing jobs. But since then, Mayor Crusinberry says, lots of things have improved in Hoopeston, while costs of housing have been able to stay rather low.
AUDIO: Our retail base has picked up. Our McDonald’s, which was new I think in 1975, about five years ago they replaced it with a brand new McDonald’s. Subway just finished a brand new building. Two or three downtown business owners are expanding into various other businesses. We got a grant last year to tear down dilapidated houses through Vermilion County Land Bank. So by that, we are cleaning up our town.
And, the mayor mentioned one expansion especially: health care.
AUDIO: We’re very fortunate for a small town to have a hospital, and they merged into the Carle system a few years ago. And Carle did about a four million dollar renovation of the emergency room and surgery. And then in the meantime they built a new 75 bed nursing home in Hoopeston, and we got a 50 bed assisted living in Hoopeston, all new in the last six or seven years.
Mayor Crusinberry says, good schools in Hoopeston also make it a great place to raise a family. By the way the rest of SmartAsset.com’s top five list had Sumner first, Carmi second, Hillsboro fourth, and Pana fifth.
For more information, go to https://smartasset.com/mortgage/how-much-house-can-i-afford#illinois.
