Finally. After falling a hideous 38 percent from 2006 to 2012—as if you could forget!—the median value of a Chicago-area house roared up more than 9 percent in 2013 to $178,000, according to research firm Zillow. For details on how your area did, see the charts below. They include price data for all neighborhoods and metro-area suburbs that had 20 or more sales last year.

Though you might have gotten a better deal in 2013, this is still a good time to buy, says Svenja Gudell, Zillow’s director of economic research. Owning a home in the metro area is still a whopping 47 percent cheaper than renting a comparable place, according to Trulia, another real-estate research firm, as long as you plan to stay put for at least seven years.