Side-by-side metrics and state or size-class ranks use the same Census and FBI fields shown on this profile. Results stay in the URL so you can bookmark or share them.
Place dossier plate
SheetIL-FREEPORT-IL · Freeport, IL 23,636 pop · income 17th pct · 13 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 Freeport
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Freeport on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Columbus · lowest
40,588
Columbus · lowest
40,588 median HH income
32.8% of the leader · rank #1
Thunderbird B… · near
48,179
Thunderbird B… · near
48,179 median HH income
38.9% of the leader · rank #2
Freeport · this city
48,181
Freeport · this city
48,181 median HH income
38.9% of the leader · rank #3
Hampton · near
48,182
Hampton · near
48,182 median HH income
38.9% of the leader · rank #4
Ceredo · near
48,184
Ceredo · near
48,184 median HH income
38.9% of the leader · rank #5
Lackawanna · near
48,185
Lackawanna · near
48,185 median HH income
38.9% of the leader · rank #6
South Elgin · highest
123,744
South Elgin · highest
123,744 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 Freeport 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: 23,636.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Freeport - the verdict
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Freeport lands in the 17th percentile for household income and the 38th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
17th
percentile, household income
5th
percentile, home value
18th
percentile, median rent
38th
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: Freeport, IL
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 23,636 residents in Freeport, a small city within Illinois. The typical household in Freeport brings in $48,181 a year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 13.2%. Typical homes in Freeport are valued around $86,100, and the median resident age is 43.2 years. 20.0% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 54.2% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 2 residential building permits were authorized in Freeport (Stable), up 0% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Freeport reports a comparatively low crime rate: per-100,000 total crime stands at 1769.5 in FBI UCR data, below the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Illinois tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: the state registers 100.0 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Near Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,063 monthly. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts Illinois's average monthly utility costs around $240 (state average). Commute times here average 14.8 minutes, with 74.1% driving alone and 9.6% working from home, per Census ACS commuting data. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 54.5 out of 100 (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Freeport'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 reported crime to work and mobility to comparison shortlist to population change to housing and income; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Freeport, city-specific coverage includes matched public-school count, local building permits, within-city Census tract profiles, annual population history, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
What can 13 Census tracts reveal inside Freeport?
PlainCities matches 13 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.
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 8 public schools within the city match. 20.0% 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.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Freeport?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 1769.5 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 22% lower 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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Freeport?
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 Illinois, the closest population matches are Blue Island (23,416 residents, $60,965 income); Lisle (23,413 residents, $106,173 income); Rolling Meadows (23,981 residents, $100,424 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Fernley, NV (23,631 residents); Marshall, TX (23,646 residents); Griffin, GA (23,650 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.
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.
Work and mobility
What does the journey to work look like in Freeport?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 74.1%. The reported mean trip to work is 14.8 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. 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
74.1%
Work from home
9.6%
Public transit
1.1%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 10,320 workers age 16+.
Is Freeport growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -756 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -3.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 2 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 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.
2020 estimate
23,958
2025 estimate
23,202
Period change
-3.2%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
How far does income reach against housing in Freeport?
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. The ratio makes housing the clearest place to start this profile, but a low multiple can coexist with slow demand, older stock, or household-level hardship. Compare the home-value distribution and same-state peer table before treating it as an advantage.
The home-value-to-income reference is relatively compact: the ACS median home value is 1.8 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 13.2%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
1.8×
Home value
$86,100
Household income
$48,181
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Illinois average
F
City profile score · Freeport, IL
28/100
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.
Cost of living D
100.0 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Bachelor's+ share F
20.0%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate F
13.2%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime F
363 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income F
$48,181
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Freeport profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 40/100 (D) · 100.0 index
Bachelor's+ share: 34/100 (F) · 20.0%
Poverty rate: 27/100 (F) · 13.2%
Violent crime: 25/100 (F) · 363 /100k
Household income: 18/100 (F) · $48,181
Where Freeport sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Freeport'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 - Freeport highlighted among 10 peers.Read the chart values
Freeport, IL (this city): home $86,100, crime 1,770/100k
Marshall, TX : home $133,000, crime 1,919/100k
Griffin, GA : home $195,100, crime 4,287/100k
Cartersville, GA : home $298,000, crime 1,950/100k
Blue Island, IL : home $169,800, crime 3,121/100k
Lisle, IL : home $407,000, crime 498/100k
Rolling Meadows, IL : home $299,700, crime 1,374/100k
Elmwood Park, IL : home $325,000, crime 1,277/100k
South Elgin, IL : home $296,100, crime 856/100k
Loves Park, IL : home $144,900, crime 1,737/100k
How does Freeport compare to other US cities?
Here's how Freeport stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income17% higher than other cities
Home value5% pricier than other cities
Median rent18% pricier than other cities
Safety38% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Illinois and the picture shifts: Freeport ranks #343 of 455 Illinois cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Freeport against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Illinois only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Illinois-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Freeport near the bottom of Illinois's cities
Among the 1,336 Illinois cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Freeport ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Freeport only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1,134 of 1,311
14th percentile in Illinois
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,336
0th percentile in Illinois
Median Home Value
#992 of 1,315
24th percentile in Illinois
Poverty Rate
#314 of 1,335
76th percentile in Illinois
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#580 of 1,336
56th percentile in Illinois
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 Illinois only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
17th percentile nationally for median household income · 38th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Freeport's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Freeport'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 Freeport's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$86,100Among the most affordablemore affordable than 95% 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
Freeport's home-value-to-income ratio: 1.8×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#964 of 15,516
More affordable than 94% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#28 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 1.8×, Freeport sits in the affordable band:
national rank #964 of 15,516 and #28 of 3,317small cities (10,000–49,999).
The multiple is comparatively compact among tracked cities, but a low ratio can still coexist with slow demand or household-level hardship.
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
$48,181Freeport, IL median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Freeport, IL median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Freeport, IL.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)20.0%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)13.2%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)54.2%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
23,636
Median Income
$48,181
Median Home Value
$86,100
Median Age
43.2
Poverty Rate
13.2%
Labor force participation
54.2%
Bachelor's Degree+
20.0%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1769.5
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
362.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1406.9
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
8
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Freeport's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
23,958 residents
2021
23,726 residents
2022
23,484 residents
2023
23,371 residents
2024
23,311 residents
2025
23,202 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
🏗️ Stable
Total Permits (2024)
2
housing units authorized
Single-Family
2
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.1
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
2
2
0
$0.4M
2020
2
0
2
$0.2M
2021
4
4
0
$0.9M
2022
4
4
0
$0.9M
2023
3
1
2
$0.5M
2024
2
2
0
$0.6M
Permit volume increased 0% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
14.8 minutes
Drive Alone
74.1%
Carpool
10.8%
Public Transit
1.1%
Walk
2.6%
Work from Home
9.6%
Other
1.8%
Based on 10,320 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Illinois statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $240
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Illinois at $240 (electricity about $100 , water and sewer about $50 ).
These are Illinois statewide averages, not a meter reading for Freeport. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Illinois's BEA cost-of-living index is 100.0 (Near Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Freeport is $1,063/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Illinois statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 54.5 / 100 (Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Illinois statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Freeport sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Freeport compares to similar-size Illinois 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.