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Place dossier plate
SheetIL-ROLLING-MEADOWS-IL · Rolling Meadows, IL 23,981 pop · income 78th 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 Rolling Meadows
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Rolling Meadows on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Kankakee · lowest
45,119
Kankakee · lowest
45,119 median HH income
18.0% of the leader · rank #1
Knik River · near
100,417
Knik River · near
100,417 median HH income
40.2% of the leader · rank #2
Rough and Rea… · near
100,417
Rough and Rea… · near
100,417 median HH income
40.2% of the leader · rank #3
Willey · near
100,417
Willey · near
100,417 median HH income
40.2% of the leader · rank #4
Rolling Meado… · this city
100,424
Rolling Meado… · this city
100,424 median HH income
40.2% of the leader · rank #5
Milton · near
100,428
Milton · near
100,428 median HH income
40.2% of the leader · rank #6
Brambleton · highest
250,001
Brambleton · highest
250,001 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 Rolling Meadows 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: 23,981.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Rolling Meadows - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Rolling Meadows places in the 78th percentile for household income and the 50th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
78th
percentile, household income
65th
percentile, home value
18th
percentile, median rent
50th
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: Rolling Meadows, IL
Illinois's Rolling Meadows is a small city, with 23,981 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Rolling Meadows households earn a median of $100,424 annually, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 4.9%. Typical homes in Rolling Meadows are valued around $299,700, and the median resident age is 38.5 years. 40.5% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 67.9% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Housing supply pressure shows in Census Building Permit Survey data: 1 residential units were authorized in 2024 (Low Activity). Rolling Meadows reports a comparatively low crime rate: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 1373.7 total incidents per 100,000 residents here, below the national average (agency reporting is voluntary, so this measures reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Illinois tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Illinois at 100.0 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Near Average). Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,063 monthly. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Illinois run around $240, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Natural-hazard exposure scores 54.5 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Rolling Meadows'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 population change to comparison shortlist to work and mobility to housing and income to schools and households to reported crime; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Rolling Meadows, city-specific coverage includes local building permits, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, annual population history, matched public-school count.
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. Population change
Is Rolling Meadows growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
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 -474 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -2.0% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 1 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Which cities make useful reference points for Rolling Meadows?
Within Illinois, the closest population matches are Elmwood Park (23,982 residents, $84,121 income); South Elgin (23,984 residents, $123,744 income); Collinsville (24,126 residents, $65,170 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Bloomingdale, FL (23,979 residents); Solon, OH (23,970 residents); North Potomac, MD (23,994 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.
What does the journey to work look like in Rolling Meadows?
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.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 70.8%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
How far does income reach against housing in Rolling Meadows?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.0 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 4.9%, 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. Income and home value move within the same broad scale here. The useful next check is not a generic affordability label, but whether similar-size cities offer a materially different income, housing, or commute trade-off.
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 Rolling Meadows?
The NCES join finds 6 public schools within the city match. 40.5% 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.
Matched public schools
6
Bachelor's degree+
40.5%
Poverty estimate
4.9%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Rolling Meadows?
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 1373.7 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 40% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
1274.0
Violent rate
99.7
Total reported rate
1373.7
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Illinois average
B-
City profile score · Rolling Meadows, IL
66/100
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.
Household income B+
$100,424
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share B+
40.5%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime B
100 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Poverty rate B-
4.9%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
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.
Rolling Meadows profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Household income: 77/100 (B+) · $100,424
Bachelor's+ share: 76/100 (B+) · 40.5%
Violent crime: 71/100 (B) · 100 /100k
Poverty rate: 66/100 (B-) · 4.9%
Cost of living: 40/100 (D) · 100.0 index
Where Rolling Meadows sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Rolling Meadows'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 - Rolling Meadows highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Rolling Meadows, IL (this city): home $299,700, crime 1,374/100k
Solon, OH : home $375,700, crime 855/100k
Gardner, KS : home $276,000, crime 1,017/100k
Kingston, NY : home $277,900, crime 1,995/100k
Elmwood Park, IL : home $325,000, crime 1,277/100k
South Elgin, IL : home $296,100, crime 856/100k
Collinsville, IL : home $157,700, crime 1,954/100k
Westmont, IL : home $369,100, crime 1,106/100k
Freeport, IL : home $86,100, crime 1,770/100k
How does Rolling Meadows compare to other US cities?
Here's how Rolling Meadows stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income78% higher than other cities
Home value65% pricier than other cities
Median rent18% pricier than other cities
Safety50% 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 Illinois alone, Rolling Meadows ranks #298 of 455 Illinois 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 Rolling Meadows 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 Rolling Meadows near the bottom of Illinois's cities
Among the 1,336 Illinois cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Rolling Meadows ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Rolling Meadows only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#217 of 1,311
83rd percentile in Illinois
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,336
0th percentile in Illinois
Median Home Value
#149 of 1,315
89th percentile in Illinois
Poverty Rate
#850 of 1,335
36th percentile in Illinois
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#180 of 1,336
86th 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
78th percentile nationally for median household income · 50th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Rolling Meadows's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Rolling Meadows'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 Rolling Meadows's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$299,70035th percentilemore affordable than 35% 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
Rolling Meadows's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.0×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#6,608 of 15,516
More affordable than 57% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#877 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.0×, Rolling Meadows sits in the affordable band:
national rank #6,608 of 15,516 and #877 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
$100,424Rolling Meadows, IL median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Rolling Meadows, 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 Rolling Meadows, IL.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)40.5%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)4.9%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)67.9%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
23,981
Median Income
$100,424
Median Home Value
$299,700
Median Age
38.5
Poverty Rate
4.9%
Labor force participation
67.9%
Bachelor's Degree+
40.5%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1373.7
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
99.7
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1274.0
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.
Schools
Total Schools
6
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Rolling Meadows's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
24,164 residents
2021
23,845 residents
2022
23,636 residents
2023
23,580 residents
2024
23,729 residents
2025
23,690 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
🏗️ Low Activity
Total Permits (2024)
1
housing units authorized
Single-Family
1
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
0
0
0
-
2020
52
12
40
$7.3M
2021
55
11
44
$7.1M
2022
0
0
0
-
2023
0
0
0
-
2024
1
1
0
$0.4M
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
70.8%
Carpool
9.8%
Public Transit
2.3%
Walk
2.0%
Work from Home
13.5%
Other
1.6%
Based on 12,505 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 Rolling Meadows. 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 Rolling Meadows 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 Rolling Meadows sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Rolling Meadows 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.