61920Charleston, Illinois

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 61920.

59out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 47% of 5,298 profiles measured

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 34% of 6,210 ZIP areas measured63
Schools2909th of 4,422 ZIP areas measured39
Growth2968th of 5,428 ZIP areas measured48
Housing affordabilityTop 12% of 6,685 ZIP areas measured99
Climate4092nd of 6,789 ZIP areas measured67
Physical resilience4559th of 6,709 ZIP areas measured41
Access5654th of 6,791 ZIP areas measured76
Economic stability5051st of 6,742 ZIP areas measured44
The quick read

Unemployment is 4.1% and median household income $52,429, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published ZIP profiles.

In the public schools here, 17% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 15.2 students for every teacher.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 19% of median household income and the median home is 2.8 times it.

At a glance

Population
20,951
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$52,429
Bottom 18% nationally
Density
141/sq mi
148.3 sq mi of land
Median age
30.6
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Charleston
Illinois
Metro area
Charleston-Mattoon, IL
Nearest major airport
HUF
45 mi · Terre Haute Rgnl
Median home value
$149,200
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.1% is lower than 65% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment grew 0.2% over the past year, to 22,562 employed residents.

35% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 73% of measured US ZIP areas.

Median household income of $52,429 is below 82% of measured US ZIP areas.

MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Median household income ±$3,666$52,429Bottom 18%of 31,2952024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,458$33,403Bottom 39%of 32,8222024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate21.7%Top 15%of 32,9702024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute17.8 minBottom 8%of 32,8872024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher34.9%Top 27%of 33,1932024 ACS 5-Year
Employment22,562Bottom 22%of 6,544June 2026
Employment change (3 years)3.9%Top 9%of 6,542June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.2%Top 25%of 6,544June 2026
Labor force23,516Bottom 22%of 6,544June 2026
Labor force participation64.5%Top 35%of 33,2522024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.2%Top 44%of 6,544June 2026
Unemployment rate4.1%Bottom 35%of 6,544June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202454k51k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $52,429 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.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish labor-force data for ZIP areas. This is the figure for Charleston, IL, the city containing this ZIP code.

17% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 20% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 15.2 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
7
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
15.2
across all schools here
Math proficiency
17.0%
Bottom 38% in Illinois
Reading proficiency
19.8%
Bottom 31% in Illinois
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Charleston High SchoolCharleston CUSD 179516.6
Jefferson Elem SchoolCharleston CUSD 169816.212%20%
Carl Sandburg Elem SchoolCharleston CUSD 155514.227%22%
Charleston Middle SchoolCharleston CUSD 140113.412%17%
Mark Twain Elem SchoolCharleston CUSD 122113.8
Shelbyville TAOEPClk/Cls/Cmbn/Dglas/Edgr/Mltr/Shlb0
Lerna TAOEPClk/Cls/Cmbn/Dglas/Edgr/Mltr/Shlb0

49.6% 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 Illinois’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 $812 takes 19% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.8 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
18.6%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.8×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$812
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$149,200
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Home price to income2.85Bottom 41%of 30,4042024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate53.3%Bottom 11%of 32,9102024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±2949,621Top 17%of 33,7722024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$45$812Bottom 25%of 26,6182024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$10,373$149,200Bottom 26%of 30,9412024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income18.6%Top 44%of 26,4702024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate8.1%Bottom 38%of 33,0282024 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
48/ 100
Ranks 2968 of 5,428 published city profiles

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.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 0% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 0.4 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US ZIP areas.

Units permitted
6
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.4
Bottom 13% nationally
Year over year
+100%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings

The Building Permits Survey is not published for ZIP areas. This is the figure for Charleston, IL, the city containing this ZIP code.

Weather & climate

6 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 86°F and January a low of 20°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 36.0 inches.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station MATTOON COLES CO AP, 7.1 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.7"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation36.0"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low20°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high86°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months61991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing48°F1991-2020 Normals

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.

Physical risk

41 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, earthquake and tornado.

DroughtElevated
EarthquakeElevated
Inland floodingElevated
TornadoElevated
HailModerate
Strong windModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, cold wave, heat wave, landslide, ice storm, lightning, hurricane, wildfire.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. ZIP values are the land-area-weighted mean of the counties the ZIP Code Tabulation Area intersects. Expected annual loss is not allocated below county level. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences — they say nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Coles County records 3.1 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 10.8 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 12.7 per 100,000 residents in Coles County.

Homicide
3.1
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
10.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
12.7
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
14.4
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 Coles 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 61920 rather than 61920 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
Offences reported to police are published by department rather than by town, and only where a department reported every month of the year. No municipal department reports for this place — many smaller communities are policed by the county — so there is no figure to show. A partial year is never scaled up to look complete, and arrest counts or news volume are never substituted for it.
Taxes
Taxes are not published: no source covers them nationally with a method open enough to check. Cost of living now is — the index above is the Bureau of Economic Analysis price parity for this area — but it is a price level for all consumption rather than a budget for a household, its spread is driven mostly by housing, and it excludes taxes. Housing affordability is computed separately from rent, price and income, because that answers a narrower and more actionable question. Nothing here is individualised tax advice.
Anything about a specific address
Every figure describes an area, not a street or a house. School attendance zones, insurance pricing and the character of a neighbourhood all vary within the places measured here.

Access

4 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 45 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Terre Haute RgnlHUF45 mi9,021 ft
Central Il Rgnl/Bloomington-NormalBMI78 mi8,000 ft
Abraham Lincoln CapitalSPI84 mi8,001 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
59
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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
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
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them

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.

61920 vs Charleston

How this ZIP area compares with Charleston as a whole. Both figures come from the same ACS release, so the comparison is like for like.

61920
Charleston
Median household income
$52,429
vs
$49,300
Per capita income
$33,403
vs
$31,560
Population density
141/sq mi
vs
1,880/sq mi
Median home value
$149,200
vs
$137,400
Median gross rent
$812
vs
$817
Homeownership rate
53.3%
vs
48.0%
Bachelor's degree or higher
34.9%
vs
33.3%
Poverty rate
21.7%
vs
26.3%
Median age
30.6
vs
29.6

Some demographic statistics use Census ZIP Code Tabulation Areas, which approximate but do not exactly match USPS ZIP delivery geography. See the methodology for how AreaProfile maps between them.