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Place dossier plate
SheetFL-WEST-PALM-BEACH-FL · West Palm Beach, FL 119,508 pop · income 48th pct · 373 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 West Palm Beach
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest West Palm Beach on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Hartford · lowest
45,300
Hartford · lowest
45,300 median HH income
41.7% of the leader · rank #1
Craig · near
69,256
Craig · near
69,256 median HH income
63.8% of the leader · rank #2
West Palm Bea… · this city
69,261
West Palm Bea… · this city
69,261 median HH income
63.8% of the leader · rank #3
Lansdowne · near
69,261
Lansdowne · near
69,261 median HH income
63.8% of the leader · rank #4
Winterset · near
69,268
Winterset · near
69,268 median HH income
63.8% of the leader · rank #5
Kimball · near
69,271
Kimball · near
69,271 median HH income
63.8% of the leader · rank #6
Berkeley · highest
108,558
Berkeley · highest
108,558 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 West Palm Beach 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: 119,508.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
West Palm Beach - the verdict
West Palm Beach ranks in the 48th percentile for household income and the 19th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
48th
percentile, household income
74th
percentile, home value
73rd
percentile, median rent
19th
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: West Palm Beach, FL
Florida's West Palm Beach is a mid-sized U.S. city, with 119,508 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Households in West Palm Beach report a median income of $69,261 per year, below the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 11.3%. Typical homes in West Palm Beach are valued around $369,800, and the median resident age is 40.2 years. Educational attainment runs 37.7% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 60.6% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 230 residential units authorized here in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 57% from five years earlier. Crime here tracks close to the national norm: FBI UCR reporting places total crime at 2713.8 incidents per 100,000 residents, near the national average (voluntary agency reporting, reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). NOAA puts West Palm Beach's yearly average temperature at 75.8°F with 61.8 inches of precipitation per year.
Florida carries a cost-of-living premium: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Florida at 103.4 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Above Average). A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $1,526 per month statewide. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Florida run around $225, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 75.7 out of 100 (High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of West Palm Beach'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 schools and households to climate and hazard context to comparison shortlist to work and mobility to within-city variation to housing and income to population change; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For West Palm Beach, city-specific coverage includes annual population history, commute-mode shares, within-city Census tract profiles, FBI reported-crime rates, local building permits, matched public-school count.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
What can the FBI record say about safety in West Palm Beach?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 2713.8 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 19% 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.
What does the education layer cover for West Palm Beach?
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. 37.7% 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.
Which cities make useful reference points for West Palm Beach?
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 Florida, the closest population matches are Spring Hill (118,814 residents, $66,557 income); Clearwater (117,075 residents, $64,440 income); Lakeland (117,030 residents, $60,947 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Hartford, CT (119,970 residents); Fairfield, CA (119,985 residents); Berkeley, CA (120,223 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 373 Census tracts reveal inside West Palm Beach?
PlainCities matches 373 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 West Palm Beach?
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 75.8°F, with 61.8 inches of precipitation. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Florida is 75.7 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)
75.7
Annual precipitation
61.8 in
Mean temperature
75.8°F
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
What does the journey to work look like in West Palm Beach?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 70.9%. 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
70.9%
Work from home
12.1%
Public transit
2.4%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 59,488 workers age 16+.
How far does income reach against housing in West Palm Beach?
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 5.3 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 11.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
5.3×
Home value
$369,800
Household income
$69,261
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Is West Palm Beach growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +9,696 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +8.3% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 230 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.
2020 estimate
117,493
2025 estimate
127,189
Period change
+8.3%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
Below median income · poverty 11.3% (Above-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
103.4 (US=100)
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Florida average
F
City profile score · West Palm Beach, FL
37/100
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 B
37.7%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income D
$69,261
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
11.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Cost of living F
103.4 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
576 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
West Palm Beach profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 71/100 (B) · 37.7%
Household income: 48/100 (D) · $69,261
Poverty rate: 35/100 (F) · 11.3%
Cost of living: 25/100 (F) · 103.4 index
Violent crime: 11/100 (F) · 576 /100k
Where West Palm Beach sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
West Palm Beach'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 - West Palm Beach highlighted among 8 peers.Read the chart values
West Palm Beach, FL (this city): home $369,800, crime 2,714/100k
Hartford, CT : home $217,200, crime 3,361/100k
Fairfield, CA : home $592,500, crime 2,184/100k
Berkeley, CA : home $1,351,100, crime 5,868/100k
Wilmington, NC : home $350,300, crime 3,998/100k
Billings, MT : home $311,800, crime 3,830/100k
Richardson, TX : home $405,600, crime 1,980/100k
Palm Bay, FL : home $248,000, crime 1,365/100k
How does West Palm Beach compare to other US cities?
Here's how West Palm Beach stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income48% higher than other cities
Home value74% pricier than other cities
Median rent73% pricier than other cities
Safety19% 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 Florida alone, West Palm Beach ranks #95 of 120 Florida 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 West Palm Beach against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Florida only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Florida-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places West Palm Beach near the bottom of Florida's cities
Among the 930 Florida cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, West Palm Beach ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares West Palm Beach only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#434 of 903
52nd percentile in Florida
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 930
0th percentile in Florida
Median Home Value
#280 of 894
69th percentile in Florida
Poverty Rate
#307 of 930
66th percentile in Florida
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#277 of 930
70th percentile in Florida
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 Florida only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
48th percentile nationally for median household income · 19th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
West Palm Beach's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
West Palm Beach'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 West Palm Beach's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$369,80026th percentilemore affordable than 26% 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
West Palm Beach's home-value-to-income ratio: 5.3×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#13,367 of 15,516
More affordable than 14% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#496 of 750
Mid-size cities (50,000–199,999)
At 5.3×, West Palm Beach sits in the pressured band:
national rank #13,367 of 15,516 and #496 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
$69,261West Palm Beach, FL median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context West Palm Beach, FL median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for West Palm Beach, FL.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)37.7%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)11.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)60.6%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
119,508
Median Income
$69,261
Median Home Value
$369,800
Median Age
40.2
Poverty Rate
11.3%
Labor force participation
60.6%
Bachelor's Degree+
37.7%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2713.8
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
575.8
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2138.0
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
75.8°F
Annual Precipitation
61.8"
Annual Snowfall
N/A
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
West Palm Beach's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
117,493 residents
2021
117,964 residents
2022
122,288 residents
2023
126,327 residents
2024
127,364 residents
2025
127,189 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
230
housing units authorized
Single-Family
85
detached homes
Multifamily
145
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
1.9
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
529
69
460
$91.2M
2020
511
93
418
$228.3M
2021
1,676
102
1,574
$370.6M
2022
1,519
102
1,417
$271.5M
2023
406
82
324
$39.7M
2024
230
85
145
$79.1M
Permit volume decreased 57% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
70.9%
Carpool
9.6%
Public Transit
2.4%
Walk
1.9%
Work from Home
12.1%
Other
3.1%
Based on 59,488 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Florida statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $225
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Florida at $225 (electricity about $145 , water and sewer about $55 ).
These are Florida statewide averages, not a meter reading for West Palm Beach. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Florida's BEA cost-of-living index is 103.4 (Above Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around West Palm Beach is $1,526/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Florida statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 75.7 / 100 (High).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Florida statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county West Palm Beach sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How West Palm Beach compares to similar-size Florida 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.