Chicago Bears Relocation Odds: Indiana, Illinois, Or Neither?
On August 13, 2026, Bears president Kevin Warren told reporters that "our sole focus at this point in time is working a world-class stadium and mixed-use development in Hammond, Indiana." Two months earlier the team's board had voted to advance that project, and Indiana has already passed the funding law to build it. Kalshi turned the whole question into a market: does the franchise land in Indiana, in a new Illinois home at Arlington Heights, somewhere in Iowa, or nowhere at all by the first game of the 2028 season? We asked a price-blind AI panel to score every outcome. The models agree Indiana is the front-runner, but they read the crowd's Illinois number as far too high and the "nothing gets announced" outcome as far too cheap.
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The Quick Answer
Kalshi's crowd makes Indiana the favorite near 58 cents, with a new location in Illinois (Arlington Heights) close behind near 50 cents, Iowa a dead longshot at 1 cent, and do not relocate or announce a relocation at just 2 cents. Our price-blind, five-model panel lands on the same favorite but splits the field very differently: Indiana about 62%, Illinois only about 16%, Iowa 1%, and the "nothing announced by 2028" outcome about 20%. The panel is not fighting the Indiana call. It is fighting the idea that Arlington Heights is still a coin flip, and the idea that a formal relocation is nearly certain to be announced inside two years.
- Market Favorite: Indiana (Hammond), about 58¢
- Model Favorite: Indiana, about 62% blend (same pick, a touch more conviction)
- Biggest Disagreement: Illinois, priced near 50¢ by the crowd but only about 16% by the panel
- The Second Disagreement: "do not relocate or announce" sits at 2¢ but the panel blends it to about 20%
- The Wrinkle Most Readers Miss: a contract settles YES on an official announcement, not a completed move, so the team can still play at Soldier Field in 2028 and Indiana can still resolve YES
- The Panel's Logic In One Line: one track is board-approved and funded, one has been stuck on public money for years, and two years is not as long as it sounds for a binding announcement.
The stadium timeline, the settlement wrinkle that shapes every price, the full model-by-model board, the dark-horse outcome the crowd is sleeping on, and a plain-English read on the market are all below.
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The Market At A Glance
| Venue | Kalshi, a CFTC-regulated event-contract exchange (18+; availability varies by state, as of August 2026) |
| The Event | "Where will the Chicago Pro Football Team relocate?" (Kalshi event KXRELOCATIONCHI-28), four mutually exclusive yes/no contracts: a new location in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, or do not relocate/announce |
| The Contract | A location resolves YES if the team relocates OR officially announces a relocation to that location by the first game of the 2028 season. It can resolve YES even if the team still plays 2028 home games at its current stadium |
| Window | Kalshi's listed expected expiration is September 7, 2028, roughly the first game of the 2028 regular season, and a location market can resolve early once an announcement lands |
| Prices Below As Of | August 14, 2026 (latest snapshot; prices on this page refresh during any stadium-news wave) |
These are model estimates, not predictions of fact and not financial advice. Kalshi event contracts trade on a CFTC-regulated exchange; you must be 18 or older and in an eligible state to participate. Every number in this piece gets graded in public once the market settles, in the full graded Model Verdict scoreboard.
The Board
Sorted by how far the AI blend sits from the market price. A negative edge means the panel thinks the crowd's price is too high; a positive edge means the panel thinks it is too low.
| Outcome | Market | AI blend | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Indiana (Hammond / NW Indiana) | 58¢ | 62% | +4 |
| A New Location In Illinois (Arlington Heights) | 50¢ | 16% | −34 |
| Do Not Relocate Or Announce A Relocation | 2¢ | 20% | +18 |
| Iowa | 1¢ | 1% | 0 |
More live boards from the same panel: Maxx Crosby Next Team Odds (the panel makes "stays with Las Vegas or retires" the favorite, near 70¢ on Kalshi today) · NFL Win Totals 2026 (the Bears' own "9+ wins" contract trades near 62¢) · Super Bowl 2027 Odds (Chicago to win it all sits at 3¢). Prices fetched August 14, 2026.
Every Seat's Number
The panel ran price-blind: no model saw a single Kalshi price before committing to a number. Each read the same fetched, dated fact card and scored all four outcomes as one distribution, then revised once after reading the others' anonymized reasoning. Our standard panel is eight models; five returned verdicts this cycle, and the blend is the equal-weight mean of those five.
| Outcome | Opus | Sonnet | GLM | Kimi | DeepSeek | Blend | Market |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Indiana | 63 | 62 | 61 | 62 | 64 | 62% | 58¢ |
| A New Location In Illinois | 16 | 16 | 18 | 16 | 15 | 16% | 50¢ |
| Do Not Relocate Or Announce | 20 | 21 | 20 | 21 | 20 | 20% | 2¢ |
| Iowa | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1% | 1¢ |
Every seat on this panel is graded against real market settlements — records to date: GLM 81% on 2,318 graded calls · Kimi 83% on 2,296 graded calls · DeepSeek 80% on 2,343 graded calls. Recomputed daily; the full scoreboard is public.
These are model estimates, not predictions of fact and not financial advice.
What Anchors This Market
Three tracks decide this board, and the fetched record explains why the panel splits the field the way it does.
The Indiana track is the only one that is both approved and funded. In February 2026, Indiana enacted Senate Bill 27, creating a Northwest Indiana Stadium Authority and designating Hammond, about 28 miles from Chicago, as the site; Governor Mike Braun signed the funding measure. On June 5, 2026, the Bears' board voted to advance the Hammond project. As of August 13, the team has finished reviewing the "Lost Marsh" site, is running due diligence on a second site called "Wolf Lake Terminal," and may merge the two. That is the profile of a project moving toward a decision, not away from one.
The Illinois track owns the land but not the money. The Bears bought the 326-acre Arlington Park site in a deal that closed in February 2023 for $197.2 million, and chairman George McCaskey still name-checks it: "We will be the Chicago Bears whether we're in Arlington or whether we're in Hammond." But the enclosed-stadium plan has been stalled for years on roughly $826 million in public infrastructure funding and an unresolved property-tax freeze (the funding gap was still unresolved as of late 2025). Illinois lawmakers are countering (an April megaprojects bill, a June stadium-authority bill the House never voted on, and a June proposal from Rep. Martin McLaughlin pairing a $2.5 billion team investment with about $1.3 billion in state infrastructure), and Governor J.B. Pritzker has left the door open to a special session. The land keeps Arlington Heights alive. The stalemate is why the panel treats it as the underdog, not the co-favorite the crowd prices.
The "do nothing" track is cheaper than the risk deserves. For "do not relocate or announce" to resolve YES, the entire saga has to stay formally unresolved for two more years despite a board-approved Indiana project. That is unlikely, which is why nobody prices it as the favorite. But it is not a 2-cent event either: due diligence on two Indiana sites can surface financing or environmental snags, a site merger adds complexity, and the current Soldier Field lease runs through 2033 (with an early-exit option the team could invoke, but no requirement to), so there is no deadline forcing management's hand. The panel gives that slippage about a one-in-five chance.
Where The Crowd And The Panel Split
The headline is not the favorite; both sides pick Indiana. The story is the other two prices.
On Illinois, the panel and the crowd are almost 34 points apart. The market still treats Arlington Heights as a near coin flip at 50 cents. The models, reading the same public record, see a track that has been stuck for years while the team's own language and its board vote point across the state line. If you believe the "sole focus" quote is real intent rather than leverage, 50 cents on Illinois is the single richest price on the board.
On do not relocate or announce, the gap runs the other way: 2 cents versus a roughly 20% model read. The crowd is pricing an announcement as all but certain inside two years. The panel is not so sure that "advance the project" converts into "officially announce the relocation" before the 2028 opener. Those two prices are linked. A market that is 98% sure something gets announced, and splits that near-certainty roughly evenly between two states, is exactly the shape the panel pushes back on.
Dark Horses The Panel Won't Dismiss
Iowa is the true longshot, and the panel agrees with the penny price: there is no public pathway connecting the franchise to Iowa, so 1 cent is 1 percent. It earns a mention only because a complete board should account for every listed outcome, not because there is a case to make.
The real dark horse is not a place; it is the "nothing announced" outcome hiding at 2 cents. Stadium sagas are famous for slipping past optimistic timelines, and this one has already run for years. If the Indiana due diligence drags, if a site merger complicates financing, or if Illinois manages a late counter that pulls the board back into negotiation, the calendar can simply run out on a binding announcement before September 2028. The panel's 20% is the quiet contrarian call on this board.
Where The Panel Changed Its Mind
After the first round, every model read the others' anonymized reasoning and could revise. The two seats that had staked out the extremes both moved toward the center.
The seat that had priced Illinois highest walked it back after weighing the case for a late Springfield revival against the record:
Illinois stays alive because the Bears own 326 acres, McCaskey still names Arlington, and Springfield is countering ... but repeated funding failure and the board's Hammond vote make a decisive pivot the underdog. — Kimi
The seat that had been most bullish on Indiana eased off its high number too, landing on a call it framed honestly:
the evidence supports a strong but not overwhelming Indiana lean. — DeepSeek
And one seat held firm, and said why:
the panel clusters tightly around mine ... giving no evidence-based reason to move. — Opus
What Would Change The Panel's Mind
Every number here is a snapshot, and each of these is a concrete, checkable event that would move it:
- A Formal Bears Announcement Naming Hammond As The New Home. This resolves the board and pushes Indiana toward 100 while collapsing the other three. It is the single most likely mover.
- A Final Indiana Site Pick (Lost Marsh, Wolf Lake Terminal, Or A Merger). A committed site is the step just before a relocation announcement and would push Indiana up and "do nothing" down.
- An Illinois Special Session That Actually Delivers The Roughly $826 Million And The Tax Freeze. A real funding breakthrough is the one event that could revive Arlington Heights and swing the Illinois price back up.
- A Stall Past Mid-2027 With No Site Decision. The longer the window shrinks with the project still in due diligence, the more the "do not announce" outcome earns.
Settlement Timeline
| Settles | By the first game of the 2028 regular season (Kalshi expected expiration September 7, 2028) |
| Near-Term Catalysts | Indiana site decision on Lost Marsh vs. Wolf Lake Terminal; any Illinois special session on stadium funding; a Bears board or ownership announcement |
| Resolution Trigger | An official relocation announcement to any location, or a completed move; a location can resolve YES even if the team still plays 2028 home games at Soldier Field |
| Re-Scored | This page and its verdict are re-scored whenever the story moves, as of August 14, 2026 |
If you would rather act on something that settles this weekend than a call that runs to 2028, our free daily picks are a lighter lift than a two-year futures market.
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The Bottom Line
The crowd and the panel agree on the easy part: Hammond, Indiana is the most likely destination, backed by a board vote, a signed state funding law, and a management team that calls it the "sole focus." The disagreement is where the value lives. The market still prices Arlington Heights as a near coin flip; the panel, reading a track stuck on public money for years, calls that far too high. And the market treats a formal announcement as nearly certain within two years, while the panel leaves a real one-in-five chance that the saga simply drags past the 2028 opener with nothing signed. Two years sounds like plenty of runway. For a stadium fight this old, it may not be.
