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Place dossier plate
SheetCO-LAKEWOOD-CO · Lakewood, CO 156,309 pop · income 67th pct · 146 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 Lakewood
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Lakewood on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Macon-Bibb Co… · lowest
50,747
Macon-Bibb Co… · lowest
50,747 median HH income
44.7% of the leader · rank #1
Gun Club Esta… · near
85,782
Gun Club Esta… · near
85,782 median HH income
75.5% of the leader · rank #2
Lakewood · this city
85,789
Lakewood · this city
85,789 median HH income
75.5% of the leader · rank #3
Maxwell · near
85,789
Maxwell · near
85,789 median HH income
75.5% of the leader · rank #4
Pilot Rock · near
85,795
Pilot Rock · near
85,795 median HH income
75.5% of the leader · rank #5
Eureka · near
85,795
Eureka · near
85,795 median HH income
75.5% of the leader · rank #6
Alexandria · highest
113,638
Alexandria · highest
113,638 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 Lakewood 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: 156,309.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Lakewood - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Lakewood places in the 67th percentile for household income and the 2nd percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
67th
percentile, household income
87th
percentile, home value
68th
percentile, median rent
2nd
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: Lakewood, CO
Lakewood is a mid-sized U.S. city in Colorado, home to 156,309 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Lakewood households earn a median of $85,789 annually, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 5.3%. Home values in Lakewood run a median of $548,200, and the median resident age is 38.0 years. About 45.3% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 65.6% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Housing supply pressure shows in Census Building Permit Survey data: 185 residential units were authorized in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 80% from five years earlier. Lakewood's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: FBI UCR reporting places total crime at 5880.6 incidents per 100,000 residents, above the national average (voluntary agency reporting, reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). NOAA puts Lakewood's yearly average temperature at 50.4°F with 17.5 inches of precipitation per year and 58.0 inches of snowfall.
Colorado carries a cost-of-living premium: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, Colorado scores 103.1 (Above Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,429 monthly. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Colorado run around $202, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Workers in Lakewood report an average commute of 21.4 minutes, with 67.8% driving alone and 19.9% working from home. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 40.7 out of 100 (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Lakewood'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 reported crime to housing and income to climate and hazard context to population change to schools and households to comparison shortlist to within-city variation to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Lakewood, city-specific coverage includes FBI reported-crime rates, commute-mode shares, annual population history, local building permits, matched public-school count, within-city Census tract profiles.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
What can the FBI record say about safety in Lakewood?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 5880.6 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 158% 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.
How far does income reach against housing in Lakewood?
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 6.4 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 5.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Which cities make useful reference points for Lakewood?
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 Colorado, the closest population matches are Fort Collins (169,705 residents, $83,598 income); Thornton (142,878 residents, $100,985 income); Arvada (122,835 residents, $113,396 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Killeen, TX (156,144 residents); Macon-Bibb County, GA (156,543 residents); Alexandria, VA (156,788 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.
What can 146 Census tracts reveal inside Lakewood?
PlainCities matches 146 Census tracts to this city.
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.
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.
Climate and hazard context
What physical conditions frame life in Lakewood?
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 50.4°F, with 17.5 inches of precipitation and 58.0 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Colorado is 40.7 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.
FEMA risk index (state avg)
40.7
Annual precipitation
17.5 in
Mean temperature
50.4°F
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
Is Lakewood growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +664 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +0.4% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 185 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
The recent population line is broadly flat. That makes the composition of change more important than the headline count: housing turnover, household size, and age structure can shift even when the total barely moves.
2020 estimate
156,263
2025 estimate
156,927
Period change
+0.4%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
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 54 public schools within the city match. 45.3% 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
5.3%
Bachelor's degree+
45.3%
Matched public schools
54
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Lakewood?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 67.8%. The reported mean trip to work is 21.4 minutes.
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.
Drive alone
67.8%
Work from home
19.9%
Public transit
2.6%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 86,312 workers age 16+.
Above median income · poverty 5.3% (Below-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
103.1 (US=100)
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Colorado average
D
City profile score · Lakewood, CO
46/100
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-
45.3%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income B-
$85,789
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.
Cost of living F
103.1 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
787 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Lakewood profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 80/100 (A-) · 45.3%
Household income: 65/100 (B-) · $85,789
Poverty rate: 63/100 (C+) · 5.3%
Cost of living: 26/100 (F) · 103.1 index
Violent crime: 2/100 (F) · 787 /100k
Where Lakewood sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Lakewood'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 - Lakewood highlighted among 12 peers.Read the chart values
Lakewood, CO (this city): home $548,200, crime 5,881/100k
Killeen, TX : home $196,000, crime 1,910/100k
Alexandria, VA : home $696,800, crime 2,859/100k
Murfreesboro, TN : home $365,100, crime 2,442/100k
Paterson, NJ : home $335,400, crime 3,330/100k
Kansas City, KS : home $147,100, crime 4,654/100k
Fort Collins, CO : home $548,400, crime 2,428/100k
Thornton, CO : home $482,200, crime 3,109/100k
Arvada, CO : home $600,800, crime 2,765/100k
Westminster, CO : home $497,400, crime 3,844/100k
Pueblo, CO : home $230,900, crime 6,366/100k
Greeley, CO : home $369,600, crime 3,690/100k
How does Lakewood compare to other US cities?
Here's how Lakewood stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income67% higher than other cities
Home value87% pricier than other cities
Median rent68% pricier than other cities
Safety2% 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 Colorado, Lakewood ranks #109 of 116 Colorado 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 Lakewood against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Colorado only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Colorado-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Lakewood near the bottom of Colorado's cities
Among the 408 Colorado cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Lakewood ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Lakewood only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#167 of 379
56th percentile in Colorado
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 408
0th percentile in Colorado
Median Home Value
#130 of 388
66th percentile in Colorado
Poverty Rate
#192 of 408
53rd percentile in Colorado
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#145 of 408
64th percentile in Colorado
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 Colorado only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
67th percentile nationally for median household income · 2nd percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Lakewood's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Lakewood'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 Lakewood's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$548,20013th percentilemore affordable than 13% 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
Lakewood's home-value-to-income ratio: 6.4×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#14,377 of 15,516
More affordable than 7% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#612 of 750
Mid-size cities (50,000–199,999)
At 6.4×, Lakewood sits in the pressured band:
national rank #14,377 of 15,516 and #612 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
$85,789Lakewood, CO median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Lakewood, CO median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Lakewood, CO.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)45.3%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)5.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)65.6%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
156,309
Median Income
$85,789
Median Home Value
$548,200
Median Age
38.0
Poverty Rate
5.3%
Labor force participation
65.6%
Bachelor's Degree+
45.3%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
5880.6
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
787.2
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
5093.4
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
50.4°F
Annual Precipitation
17.5"
Annual Snowfall
58.0"
Schools
Total Schools
54
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Lakewood's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
156,263 residents
2021
157,164 residents
2022
156,286 residents
2023
156,481 residents
2024
157,395 residents
2025
156,927 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
185
housing units authorized
Single-Family
30
detached homes
Multifamily
155
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
1.2
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
915
235
680
$134.9M
2020
1,237
167
1,070
$238.9M
2021
364
93
271
$62.6M
2022
543
72
471
$117.5M
2023
153
102
51
$45.0M
2024
185
30
155
$47.3M
Permit volume decreased 80% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
21.4 minutes
Drive Alone
67.8%
Carpool
6.2%
Public Transit
2.6%
Walk
1.5%
Work from Home
19.9%
Other
2.0%
Based on 86,312 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Colorado statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $202
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Colorado at $202 (electricity about $90 , water and sewer about $50 ).
These are Colorado statewide averages, not a meter reading for Lakewood. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Colorado's BEA cost-of-living index is 103.1 (Above Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Lakewood is $1,429/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Colorado statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 40.7 / 100 (Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Colorado statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Lakewood sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Lakewood compares to similar-size Colorado 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.