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Place dossier plate
SheetCA-OROVILLE-CA · Oroville, CA 19,855 pop · income 23rd pct
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 Oroville
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Oroville on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Holyoke · lowest
51,892
Holyoke · lowest
51,892 median HH income
23.4% of the leader · rank #1
Oroville · this city
51,893
Oroville · this city
51,893 median HH income
23.4% of the leader · rank #2
Struthers · near
51,894
Struthers · near
51,894 median HH income
23.4% of the leader · rank #3
Piedmont · near
51,896
Piedmont · near
51,896 median HH income
23.4% of the leader · rank #4
Hawesville · near
51,898
Hawesville · near
51,898 median HH income
23.4% of the leader · rank #5
La Cañada Fli… · highest
221,451
La Cañada Fli… · highest
221,451 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #6
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 Oroville 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: 19,855.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Oroville - the verdict
Oroville ranks in the 23rd percentile for household income and the 4th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
23rd
percentile, household income
62nd
percentile, home value
88th
percentile, median rent
4th
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: Oroville, CA
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 19,855 residents in Oroville, a small town within California. Households in Oroville report a median income of $51,893 per year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 13.1%. Typical homes in Oroville are valued around $280,600, and the median resident age is 35.5 years. About 13.0% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 48.5% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 0 residential building permits were authorized in Oroville (No Permits), down 100% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Oroville's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 4800.2 total incidents per 100,000 residents here, above the national average (agency reporting is voluntary, so this measures reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). NOAA puts Oroville's yearly average temperature at 63.5°F with 30.6 inches of precipitation per year.
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. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts California's average monthly utility costs around $275 (state average). 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 Oroville'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 housing and income to comparison shortlist to climate and hazard context to population change to schools and households to work and mobility to reported crime; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Oroville, city-specific coverage includes annual population history, local building permits, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, commute-mode shares.
No matched row is reported here for within-city Census tract profiles; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Housing and income
How far does income reach against housing in Oroville?
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.
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 5.4 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 13.1%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Which cities make useful reference points for Oroville?
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.
Within California, the closest population matches are Agoura Hills (19,881 residents, $171,944 income); La Crescenta-Montrose (19,940 residents, $119,775 income); Albany (19,768 residents, $135,927 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Universal City, TX (19,853 residents); Miamisburg, OH (19,859 residents); Shelbyville, IN (19,866 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.
The two sources should not be blended into one comfort or safety score. Use the climate values for baseline conditions and the risk index as a prompt to inspect specific hazards, insurance, and local emergency guidance for a particular address.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 63.5°F, with 30.6 inches of precipitation. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for California is 88.7 out of 100. Climate normals describe long-run weather; the FEMA score on PlainCities is a state average of county NRI inputs and combines hazards, exposure, vulnerability, and resilience.
Is Oroville growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +420 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +2.1% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 0 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Recent estimates point upward. Growth can increase housing demand and service needs, but the permit record must move in the same direction before calling it a supply response; the two series measure different things.
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.
Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Oroville?
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.
The NCES join finds 27 public schools within the city match. 13.0% 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.
Poverty estimate
13.1%
Bachelor's degree+
13.0%
Matched public schools
27
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Oroville?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 77.4%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Mode share answers how workers usually travel; it does not measure congestion, reliability, distance to a particular job, or the quality of transit service. No single mode completely explains the work trip here. The mix is more useful than a one-number commute grade, especially when comparing places where transit, walking, and remote work divide the non-driving share differently.
Drive alone
77.4%
Work from home
6.4%
Public transit
1.0%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 6,993 workers age 16+.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Oroville?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 4800.2 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 110% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
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.
Total reported rate
4800.2
Violent rate
980.8
Property rate
3819.4
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Highest-decile cost · BEA RPP 2024, California average
F
City profile score · Oroville, CA
15/100
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.
Poverty rate F
13.1%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income F
$51,893
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share F
13.0%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
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.
Violent crime F
981 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Oroville profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Poverty rate: 27/100 (F) · 13.1%
Household income: 23/100 (F) · $51,893
Bachelor's+ share: 15/100 (F) · 13.0%
Cost of living: 6/100 (F) · 110.7 index
Violent crime: 0/100 (F) · 981 /100k
Where Oroville sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Oroville'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 - Oroville highlighted among 26 peers.Read the chart values
Oroville, CA (this city): home $280,600, crime 4,800/100k
Universal City, TX : home $249,400, crime 2,361/100k
Miamisburg, OH : home $203,700, crime 1,618/100k
Shelbyville, IN : home $151,100, crime 1,276/100k
Agoura Hills, CA : home $1,072,200, crime 1,019/100k
Albany, CA : home $1,188,600, crime 2,631/100k
New York, NY : home $751,700, crime 3,039/100k
Los Angeles, CA : home $879,500, crime 2,212/100k
Chicago, IL : home $315,200, crime 4,012/100k
Houston, TX : home $253,400, crime 5,442/100k
Phoenix, AZ : home $381,900, crime 3,125/100k
Philadelphia, PA : home $232,400, crime 5,457/100k
San Antonio, TX : home $219,700, crime 5,218/100k
San Diego, CA : home $848,500, crime 2,082/100k
Dallas, TX : home $295,300, crime 4,010/100k
San Jose, CA : home $1,187,800, crime 3,195/100k
Austin, TX : home $512,700, crime 3,709/100k
Fort Worth, TX : home $277,300, crime 3,158/100k
Columbus, OH : home $234,500, crime 3,088/100k
Indianapolis, IN : home $207,000, crime 4,214/100k
San Francisco, CA : home $1,380,500, crime 4,526/100k
Seattle, WA : home $912,100, crime 5,783/100k
Denver, CO : home $586,700, crime 5,755/100k
Oklahoma City, OK : home $215,100, crime 3,570/100k
El Paso, TX : home $171,700, crime 1,772/100k
Washington, DC : home $724,600, crime 4,514/100k
How does Oroville compare to other US cities?
Oroville measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income23% higher than other cities
Home value62% pricier than other cities
Median rent88% pricier than other cities
Safety4% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
National percentiles can mask local variation. Looking only at California, Oroville ranks #424 of 441 California cities by lowest crime rate - a narrower, more locally useful cut than the national comparison above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Oroville 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 Oroville near the bottom of California's cities
Among the 1,458 California cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Oroville ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Oroville only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1,159 of 1,338
13th percentile in California
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,458
0th percentile in California
Median Home Value
#1,097 of 1,343
18th percentile in California
Poverty Rate
#362 of 1,450
75th percentile in California
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#1,113 of 1,458
23rd 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
23rd percentile nationally for median household income · 4th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Oroville's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Oroville'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 Oroville's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$280,60038th percentilemore affordable than 38% 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
Oroville's home-value-to-income ratio: 5.4×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#13,462 of 15,516
More affordable than 13% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#2,784 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 5.4×, Oroville sits in the pressured band:
national rank #13,462 of 15,516 and #2,784 of 3,317small cities (10,000–49,999).
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
$51,893Oroville, CA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Oroville, 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 Oroville, CA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)13.0%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)13.1%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)48.5%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
19,855
Median Income
$51,893
Median Home Value
$280,600
Median Age
35.5
Poverty Rate
13.1%
Labor force participation
48.5%
Bachelor's Degree+
13.0%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
4800.2
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
980.8
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
3819.4
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.
Climate
Avg Temperature
63.5°F
Annual Precipitation
30.6"
Annual Snowfall
N/A
Schools
Total Schools
27
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Oroville's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
20,031 residents
2021
19,842 residents
2022
19,576 residents
2023
19,560 residents
2024
19,921 residents
2025
20,451 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
Total Permits (2024)
0
housing units authorized
Single-Family
0
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
72
60
12
$15.4M
2020
64
64
0
$14.7M
2021
253
17
236
$28.3M
2022
226
5
221
$28.0M
2023
114
5
109
$18.8M
2024
0
0
0
-
Permit volume decreased 100% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
77.4%
Carpool
9.0%
Public Transit
1.0%
Walk
3.7%
Work from Home
6.4%
Other
2.5%
Based on 6,993 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 Oroville. 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 Oroville 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 Oroville sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Oroville 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, NOAA Climate Normals, 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.