Firestone, Colorado

Area Profile

18,049 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Firestone, in Weld County.

68out of 100
Area Score
Top 25% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity2110th of 3,904 published cities54
GrowthTop 3% of 2,973 published cities82
Housing affordability2389th of 4,223 published cities77
Climate3644th of 4,223 published cities60
Physical resilienceTop 47% of 4,182 published cities62
AccessTop 42% of 4,226 published cities94
Economic stabilityTop 3% of 4,226 published cities83
The quick read

Unemployment is 4.4% and median household income $120,150, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published city profiles.

Development activity is both elevated and accelerating — 217 housing units permitted over the past twelve months, up 201% on the prior year.

A major airport is 19 miles away, giving the area unusually direct access to the national air network.

At a glance

Population
18,049
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$120,150
Top 11% nationally
Density
1,298/sq mi
13.9 sq mi of land
Median age
35.9
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Weld County
Colorado
Metro area
Greeley, CO
Nearest major airport
BJC
19 mi · Rocky Mountain Metro
Median home value
$560,100
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.4% is lower than 48% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 2.4% over the past year, to 167,853 employed residents.

38% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 79% of measured US cities.

Household income is higher than at least 89% of measured US cities.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$10,198$120,150Top 11%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$3,138$47,583Top 20%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate4.6%Bottom 22%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute34.1 minTop 19%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher37.8%Top 21%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment167,853Top 32%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-0.1%Top 50%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-2.4%Bottom 14%June 2026
Labor force175,517Top 32%June 2026
Labor force participation74.1%Top 10%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$66,780Bottom 42%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$55,070Top 34%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)0.0%Bottom 45%June 2026
Unemployment rate4.4%Top 48%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
2021202220232024120k102k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $120,150 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — Greeley, CO
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Fast Food and Counter Workers3,670$33,030
Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers2,700$59,450
Retail Salespersons2,650$36,670
Cashiers2,530$35,760
First-Line Supervisors of Construction Trades and Extraction Workers1,970$77,280
Stockers and Order Fillers1,670$44,560

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes city-level labor data only for places of 25,000 or more. This is the figure for Weld County, CO, which contains this city.

There are 18.0 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
8
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
18.0
across all schools here
Math proficiency
Reading proficiency
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Frederick Senior High SchoolSt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J1,49122.6
Mead High SchoolSt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J1,17421.3
Timberline PK-8St. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J76213.9
Coal Ridge Middle SchoolSt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J72719.6
Firestone Charter Academy · charterSt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J60014.0
Centennial ElementarySt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J52516.4
Legacy Elementary SchoolSt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J43017.2
Prairie Ridge Elementary SchoolSt. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J38715.5

39.5% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Colorado’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $2,009 takes 20% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 4.7 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
20.1%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
4.7×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$2,009
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$560,100
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income4.66Top 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate81.3%Top 39%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±2926,520Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$178$2,009Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$20,867$560,100Top 10%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income20.1%Top 40%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate3.0%Bottom 19%2024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
82/ 100
Top 3% of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing — 2 consecutive years, measured from 2020 to 2025.

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

Population has grown 16% since 2020, reaching 19,396 in 2024.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 19% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 12.0 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
217
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
12.0
Top 9% nationally
Year over year
+201%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
19.4%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202419k17k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
202020212022202320242025351119
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2020 (−55%).

Weather & climate

5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 90°F and January a low of 19°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 14.5 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 54, in the Moderate band, and about 21 days a year pass 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station DENVER INTL AP, 27.1 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND2.2"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index87.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation14.5"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low19°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high90°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 100212024 calendar year
Median air quality index54.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing44°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
54
Moderate on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
87
90th percentile index
Days above 100
21
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

62 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are cold wave, tornado and hail.

HailElevated
Cold waveModerate
TornadoHigh
WildfireModerate
EarthquakeModerate
Heat waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: strong wind, winter weather, lightning, inland flooding, ice storm, volcanic activity, landslide, drought, avalanche.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. City values are the population-weighted mean of the counties the city overlaps, using AreaProfile place-to-county land-area weights. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Weld County records 3.6 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, near the middle of counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 13.4 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 17.8 per 100,000 residents in Weld County.

Homicide
3.6
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
13.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
17.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
17.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Weld County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around Firestone rather than Firestone itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source for reported offences with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. What is published above under Safety is a different measurement — deaths rather than offences, from death certificates rather than police returns — and it covers no property crime at all.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings.

Access

9 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 19 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Rocky Mountain MetroBJC19 mi9,000 ft
Northern Colorado RgnlFNL21 mi8,500 ft
Denver IntlDEN25 mi16,000 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Area Score
68
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Other cities in Greeley, CO

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
GreeleyWeld County110,80657vs Firestone
WindsorWeld County37,91469vs Firestone
ErieWeld County33,808vs Firestone
EvansWeld County22,39655vs Firestone
JohnstownWeld County18,883vs Firestone
FrederickWeld County16,65165vs Firestone
SeveranceWeld County10,13064vs Firestone

Every city here is measured on the same scale from the same source releases, so the comparison is like for like. A higher Area Score reflects AreaProfile’s standardized weighting rather than a judgment about which is the better place to live.

Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics
2025 OEWSAnnual (spring release)
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.

ZIP codes in Firestone

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
8050463,451$113,64366