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Place dossier plate
SheetCA-DAVIS-CA · Davis, CA 66,801 pop · income 69th pct · 53 tracts
Instrument codes from this place’s ACS population and household income, BEA state COL, FBI safety, national income percentile, photo-finish peer city, home-value band, and matched Census-tract book - not a moving recommendation.
Income neighbourhood around Davis
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Davis on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Waterloo · lowest
56,344
Waterloo · lowest
56,344 median HH income
25.6% of the leader · rank #1
Eagleville · near
87,404
Eagleville · near
87,404 median HH income
39.7% of the leader · rank #2
Battlefield · near
87,414
Battlefield · near
87,414 median HH income
39.7% of the leader · rank #3
Danbury · near
87,417
Danbury · near
87,417 median HH income
39.7% of the leader · rank #4
Davis · this city
87,421
Davis · this city
87,421 median HH income
39.7% of the leader · rank #5
Goose Creek · near
87,437
Goose Creek · near
87,437 median HH income
39.7% of the leader · rank #6
Palo Alto · highest
220,408
Palo Alto · highest
220,408 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #7
What this shows Neighbourhood peers only - not a full nationwide city board. Open a near peer when the gap is small; open the poles when the spread is wide.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by population, income, and FBI crime rate
Out-of-state nearest neighbors for Davis on ACS population and median household income
, plus FBI UCR reporting rate when the extract covers this place. Link sets are deduped so each column is a distinct comparison path, not a forecast that peers share a labor market or climate.
Similar population
Nearest out-of-state cities by ACS population. This city: 66,801.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Davis - the verdict
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Davis lands in the 69th percentile for household income and the 24th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
69th
percentile, household income
95th
percentile, home value
88th
percentile, median rent
24th
percentile, safety
📝 How we sourced this
Population, income, and housing-cost figures come from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-year estimates (B-series tables). Crime data uses FBI UCR; climate uses NOAA Climate Normals; school counts come from NCES Common Core of Data; permits use the Census Building Permits Survey (BPS). See our methodology page for the full ETL pipeline and OMB / FIPS join keys.
Data Snapshot: Davis, CA
66,801 people live in Davis, California - a small city by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. The typical household in Davis brings in $87,421 a year, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 5.3%. Davis's housing stock carries a median value of $829,000, and the median resident age is 27.2 years. Educational attainment runs 75.1% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 55.8% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 111 residential units authorized here in 2024 (Building Boom), up 192% from five years earlier. Crime here tracks close to the national norm: FBI UCR figures show 2397.6 crimes per 100,000 residents, near the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score).
California carries a cost-of-living premium: the state registers 110.7 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Well Above Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $2,053 per month. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in California run around $275, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. The average commute for Davis workers runs 18.1 minutes, with 52.2% driving alone and 22.6% working from home. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 88.7 out of 100 (Very High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Davis's data
How this reading path is ordered
This is not a composite city score. It is a city-specific route through the available public records, ordered for this profile so the page starts with questions the joined data can actually answer. The route here runs from within-city variation to schools and households to work and mobility to housing and income to comparison shortlist to reported crime to population change; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Davis, city-specific coverage includes annual population history, within-city Census tract profiles, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, local building permits.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
1. Within-city variation
What can 53 Census tracts reveal inside Davis?
That layer breaks the citywide income, rent, and home-value medians into smaller Census geographies, which can reveal differences that one municipal median necessarily hides. A tract is a statistical area, not a locally defined neighborhood or a promise about conditions on a particular block. Start with the city profile for the broad comparison, then use the tract layer to test whether the same housing and income pattern is consistent across the city. Large within-city spreads are a reason to avoid treating any citywide median as a universal resident experience.
PlainCities matches 53 Census tracts to this city.
The NCES join finds 16 public schools within the city match. 75.1% of adults age 25+ hold a bachelor's degree or higher in the ACS estimate. These measures answer different questions: the school count describes local institutions, while adult attainment describes residents and cannot be used as a school-quality rating.
The city has a broader matched school footprint, but count alone does not describe performance, capacity, program availability, or attendance boundaries. This profile deliberately avoids converting it into an unsupported family-friendliness score.
Mode share answers how workers usually travel; it does not measure congestion, reliability, distance to a particular job, or the quality of transit service. Remote work has a visible role in the local pattern. That can reduce commute exposure for some workers, but it says nothing about job availability or broadband quality; read it alongside income and housing rather than as a stand-alone lifestyle score.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 52.2%. The reported mean trip to work is 18.1 minutes.
Which cities make useful reference points for Davis?
Within California, the closest population matches are Lodi (67,008 residents, $84,402 income); Madera (67,133 residents, $63,619 income); Palo Alto (67,231 residents, $220,408 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Idaho Falls, ID (66,672 residents); Delray Beach, FL (66,940 residents); Waterloo, IA (66,947 residents). A third, income-matched reference set of 6 out-of-state cities sits in the income neighbourhood chart near the Place Dossier plate. These are mechanical peer sets, not claims that the places share a labor market, climate, culture, or metro context.
Use the in-state set to hold state policy and broad price conditions more nearly constant. Use the nationwide size set to ask whether cities with a similar resident count produce different housing, income, or commute outcomes. The income set is a third lens, deliberately separate from population matching. The nationwide peer panel below adds a fourth FBI UCR reporting-rate lens, not personal risk.
These joined records add useful context, but they do not need another full-size panel. Each remains a separate measure with its own geography and source boundary.
Housing and income
How far does income reach against housing in Davis?
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 9.5 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 5.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
This is a citywide price-to-income reference, not a mortgage-affordability test; it does not include interest rates, taxes, insurance, household size, or an individual buyer's down payment. Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median. That flags a question for comparison, not a verdict: tenure, household composition, financing costs, and the age of the ACS estimate can all change what a resident actually pays.
Household income
$87,421
Home value
$829,000
Value / income
9.5×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Davis?
Treat this as a reporting-rate comparison, not a prediction of personal risk or a neighborhood-level safety grade. Tourism, daytime population, reporting practices, and variation inside the city are not adjusted away. The state rank and same-state peer table are the narrower comparisons available on this page.
The joined FBI UCR record reports 2397.6 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, near the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 5% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
2211.3
Violent rate
186.3
Total reported rate
2397.6
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Recent estimates point downward. A falling count can reflect migration, household size, annexation boundaries, or estimation noise, so it is a prompt to inspect the full series rather than a claim about local economic health.
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -792 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -1.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 111 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Period change
-1.2%
2025 estimate
66,110
2020 estimate
66,902
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
Above median income · poverty 5.3% (Below-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
110.7 (US=100)
Highest-decile cost · BEA RPP 2024, California average
C
City profile score · Davis, CA
56/100
5 published dimensions · ACS/FBI 2023
Comparative score against U.S. cities with population of 1,000 or more on Census ACS medians
(income, poverty, bachelor's share, cost of living) and FBI UCR violent-crime rates when
published. Higher means a stronger standing on those published figures, not a livability
rating, not a recommendation to move, buy, or pick a "best" city. Missing inputs drop out
and redistribute weight.
How it is calculated.
Bachelor's+ share A+
75.1%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income B-
$87,421
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate C+
5.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime C-
186 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Cost of living F
110.7 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Davis profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 100/100 (A+) · 75.1%
Household income: 67/100 (B-) · $87,421
Poverty rate: 63/100 (C+) · 5.3%
Violent crime: 50/100 (C-) · 186 /100k
Cost of living: 6/100 (F) · 110.7 index
Where Davis sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Davis's median home value and FBI crime rate plotted with similar-size and
same-state peers (padded with large cities when the peer set is thin). The second
read: pricey does not always mean safer, check which quadrant this city lands in.
Census ACS median home value vs FBI UCR crime rate - Davis highlighted among 10 peers.Read the chart values
Davis, CA (this city): home $829,000, crime 2,398/100k
Idaho Falls, ID : home $298,600, crime 1,566/100k
Delray Beach, FL : home $386,700, crime 3,053/100k
Waterloo, IA : home $150,200, crime 2,921/100k
Grand Junction, CO : home $358,300, crime 3,716/100k
Palatine, IL : home $347,900, crime 1,008/100k
Madera, CA : home $335,900, crime 1,571/100k
Palo Alto, CA : home $2,000,000+, crime 3,245/100k
Yorba Linda, CA : home $1,091,700, crime 858/100k
Union City, CA : home $1,058,200, crime 2,643/100k
How does Davis compare to other US cities?
Where Davis sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income69% higher than other cities
Home value95% pricier than other cities
Median rent88% pricier than other cities
Safety24% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
A national percentile can hide a lot of local variation: narrowed to California alone, Davis ranks #296 of 441 California cities by lowest crime rate - a different, more locally useful comparison than stacking it against the entire country.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Davis against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to California only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
California-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Davis near the bottom of California's cities
Among the 1,458 California cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Davis ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Davis only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#665 of 1,338
50th percentile in California
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,458
0th percentile in California
Median Home Value
#339 of 1,343
75th percentile in California
Poverty Rate
#815 of 1,450
43rd percentile in California
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#59 of 1,458
96th percentile in California
How in-state ranks are ordered
Ranked by raw value (highest first); a higher rank is not automatically "better" for every measure, see each metric's own context above. This is a comparison within California only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
69th percentile nationally for median household income · 24th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Davis's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Davis's percentile rank on 3 favorable-direction measures (income, affordability, safety) vs. every tracked US city -- higher on every axis is more favorable. Not a composite quality score, just the arithmetic mean of the axes shown.
How Davis's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$829,0005th percentilemore affordable than 5% of 15,600 US cities
Show national distribution
Each bar is a $25K-wide band; taller bars hold more US cities. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-Year Estimates · 2023
Davis's home-value-to-income ratio: 9.5×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#15,303 of 15,516
More affordable than 1% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#724 of 750
Mid-size cities (50,000–199,999)
At 9.5×, Davis sits in the pressured band:
national rank #15,303 of 15,516 and #724 of 750mid-size cities (50,000–199,999).
Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median, a comparison flag, not a verdict on any household.
How this ratio is calculated
Ratio = Census ACS 2023 median home value ÷ median household income for cities with both fields and population ≥ 1,000.
Rank 1 = lowest ratio (most compact). Bands match the fleet affordability thresholds used on guides (<3.0 / 3.0–5.0 / >5.0).
This is not a mortgage payment estimate and does not include rates, taxes, insurance, or down payment.
Income distribution context
$87,421Davis, CA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Davis, CA median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Davis, CA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)75.1%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)5.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)55.8%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
66,801
Median Income
$87,421
Median Home Value
$829,000
Median Age
27.2
Poverty Rate
5.3%
Labor force participation
55.8%
Bachelor's Degree+
75.1%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2397.6
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
186.3
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2211.3
per 100,000 residents
Crime reporting caveat
Reflects incidents reported to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program — agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies by jurisdiction and year, so this reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score. Not adjusted for tourism, commuter, or daytime population.
Schools
Total Schools
16
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Davis's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
66,902 residents
2021
67,088 residents
2022
66,885 residents
2023
66,392 residents
2024
66,355 residents
2025
66,110 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📈 Building Boom
Total Permits (2024)
111
housing units authorized
Single-Family
105
detached homes
Multifamily
6
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
1.7
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
38
28
10
$11.9M
2020
130
18
112
$42.6M
2021
324
27
297
$49.7M
2022
23
23
0
$4.3M
2023
227
27
200
$37.4M
2024
111
105
6
$22.8M
Permit volume increased 192% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
18.1 minutes
Drive Alone
52.2%
Carpool
3.7%
Public Transit
5.0%
Walk
3.3%
Work from Home
22.6%
Other
13.2%
Based on 32,089 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
California statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $275
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across California at $275 (electricity about $150 , water and sewer about $70 ).
These are California statewide averages, not a meter reading for Davis. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
California's BEA cost-of-living index is 110.7 (Well Above Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Davis is $2,053/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to California statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 88.7 / 100 (Very High).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a California statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Davis sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Davis compares to similar-size California cities
Same-state peer method
Closest same-state population matches, not geographic neighbors. Population + median household income come from Census Bureau ACS 5-year B01001 and B19013.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-Year 2023, FBI UCR, NCES CCD, Census BPS 2024, Census ACS B08301/B08136, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023, BEA Regional Price Parities 2024, HUD Fair Market Rents 2026, FEMA National Risk Index.