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Place dossier plate
SheetNE-PAPILLION-NE · Papillion, NE 24,063 pop · income 83rd 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 Papillion
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Papillion on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Emporia · lowest
52,787
Emporia · lowest
52,787 median HH income
45.8% of the leader · rank #1
Gardiner · near
109,583
Gardiner · near
109,583 median HH income
95.1% of the leader · rank #2
Joppatowne · near
109,589
Joppatowne · near
109,589 median HH income
95.1% of the leader · rank #3
Helena · near
109,590
Helena · near
109,590 median HH income
95.1% of the leader · rank #4
Papillion · this city
109,602
Papillion · this city
109,602 median HH income
95.1% of the leader · rank #5
Hatfield · near
109,625
Hatfield · near
109,625 median HH income
95.1% of the leader · rank #6
Middletown · highest
115,252
Middletown · highest
115,252 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 Papillion 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: 24,063.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Papillion - the verdict
Nationally, Papillion sits in the 83rd percentile for household income and the 62nd percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
83rd
percentile, household income
64th
percentile, home value
15th
percentile, median rent
62nd
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: Papillion, NE
Papillion is a small city in Nebraska, home to 24,063 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Papillion report a median income of $109,602 per year, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 2.9%. Home values in Papillion run a median of $290,900, and the median resident age is 40.6 years. Educational attainment runs 48.1% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 65.7% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 473 residential building permits were authorized in Papillion (Growing), up 16% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Papillion reports a comparatively low crime rate: FBI UCR figures show 1038.3 crimes per 100,000 residents, below the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score).
Living costs in Nebraska run below the national norm: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Nebraska at 90.1 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Well Below Average). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $1,001 per month. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts Nebraska's average monthly utility costs around $207 (state average). On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 25.8 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Very Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Papillion'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 work and mobility to reported crime to schools and households to population change to comparison shortlist; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Papillion, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, annual population history, matched public-school count, FBI reported-crime rates, local building permits.
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.
Question 1
How far does income reach against housing in Papillion?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 2.7 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 2.9%, 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.
What does the journey to work look like in Papillion?
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 78.5%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Papillion?
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 1038.3 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 54% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Which cities make useful reference points for Papillion?
Within Nebraska, the closest population matches are Columbus (24,188 residents, $67,212 income); Hastings (25,005 residents, $61,202 income); North Platte (23,030 residents, $57,805 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Bay Point, CA (24,065 residents); Middletown, DE (24,071 residents); Coral Terrace, FL (24,051 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.
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 Papillion?
The NCES join finds 17 public schools within the city match. 48.1% 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
17
Bachelor's degree+
48.1%
Poverty estimate
2.9%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
Is Papillion 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 -360 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -1.4% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 473 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Period change
-1.4%
2025 estimate
25,127
2020 estimate
25,487
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
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.
Violent crime A
34 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Cost of living A
90.1 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Bachelor's+ share A-
48.1%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income A-
$109,602
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate B+
2.9%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Papillion profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Violent crime: 88/100 (A) · 34 /100k
Cost of living: 85/100 (A) · 90.1 index
Bachelor's+ share: 82/100 (A-) · 48.1%
Household income: 81/100 (A-) · $109,602
Poverty rate: 79/100 (B+) · 2.9%
Where Papillion sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Papillion'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 - Papillion highlighted among 10 peers.Read the chart values
Papillion, NE (this city): home $290,900, crime 1,038/100k
Middletown, DE : home $399,500, crime 1,668/100k
Emporia, KS : home $127,500, crime 2,671/100k
White Bear Lake, MN : home $318,000, crime 1,411/100k
Columbus, NE : home $198,900, crime 1,012/100k
Hastings, NE : home $177,200, crime 2,325/100k
North Platte, NE : home $159,500, crime 2,730/100k
Norfolk, NE : home $199,100, crime 1,346/100k
Fremont, NE : home $194,400, crime 2,071/100k
La Vista, NE : home $244,900, crime 1,234/100k
How does Papillion compare to other US cities?
Here's how Papillion stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income83% higher than other cities
Home value64% pricier than other cities
Median rent15% pricier than other cities
Safety62% 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 Nebraska, Papillion ranks #20 of 44 Nebraska 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 Papillion against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Nebraska only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Nebraska-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Papillion near the bottom of Nebraska's cities
Among the 450 Nebraska cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Papillion ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Papillion only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#12 of 439
97th percentile in Nebraska
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 450
0th percentile in Nebraska
Median Home Value
#12 of 438
97th percentile in Nebraska
Poverty Rate
#325 of 450
27th percentile in Nebraska
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#7 of 450
98th percentile in Nebraska
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 Nebraska only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
83rd percentile nationally for median household income · 62nd percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Papillion's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Papillion'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 Papillion's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$290,90036th percentilemore affordable than 36% 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
Papillion's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#4,790 of 15,516
More affordable than 69% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#500 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 2.7×, Papillion sits in the affordable band:
national rank #4,790 of 15,516 and #500 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
$109,602Papillion, NE median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Papillion, NE median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Papillion, NE.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)48.1%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)2.9%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)65.7%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
24,063
Median Income
$109,602
Median Home Value
$290,900
Median Age
40.6
Poverty Rate
2.9%
Labor force participation
65.7%
Bachelor's Degree+
48.1%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1038.3
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
33.9
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1004.4
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.
Schools
Total Schools
17
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Papillion's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
25,487 residents
2021
25,312 residents
2022
24,906 residents
2023
24,921 residents
2024
25,143 residents
2025
25,127 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
🏗️ Growing
Total Permits (2024)
473
housing units authorized
Single-Family
473
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
19.7
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
408
262
146
$82.6M
2020
666
422
244
$148.8M
2021
1,064
494
570
$203.0M
2022
801
384
417
$138.5M
2023
340
340
0
$91.0M
2024
473
473
0
$133.7M
Permit volume increased 16% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
78.5%
Carpool
5.7%
Public Transit
0.1%
Walk
0.5%
Work from Home
14.5%
Other
0.7%
Based on 13,172 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Nebraska statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $207
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Nebraska at $207 (electricity about $100 , water and sewer about $42 ).
These are Nebraska statewide averages, not a meter reading for Papillion. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Nebraska's BEA cost-of-living index is 90.1 (Well Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Papillion is $1,001/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Nebraska statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 25.8 / 100 (Very Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Nebraska statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Papillion sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Papillion compares to similar-size Nebraska 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.