Unfortunate home -- middle of floor is in a state (8)
I believe the answer is:
illinois
'a state' is the definition.
(Illinois is an example)
'unfortunate home middle of floor is' is the wordplay.
'unfortunate' becomes 'ill' ('ill' can be similar in meaning to 'unfortunate').
'home' becomes 'in' ('he's home' can mean 'he's in').
'middle of' means to look at the middle letters.
The centre of 'floor' is 'o'.
'ill'+'in'+'o'+'is'='ILLINOIS'
'in' is the link.
(Other definitions for illinois that I've seen before include "Springfield is the State capital" , "State to west of Indiana" , "US state by L. Michigan" , "Chicago state" , "Springfield is the US capital" .)