70508Lafayette, Louisiana

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 70508.

Area Score unavailable

Missing required signal: growth. AreaProfile withholds a score rather than inferring the missing dimensions.

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 22% of 6,210 published ZIP areas69
SchoolsTop 22% of 4,422 published ZIP areas73
Housing affordabilityTop 23% of 6,685 published ZIP areas94
ClimateTop 24% of 6,789 published ZIP areas77
Physical resilience5295th of 6,709 published ZIP areas25
AccessTop 21% of 6,791 published ZIP areas98
Economic stability3948th of 6,742 published ZIP areas55
The quick read

70508 ranks in the top 22% of published ZIP profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 4.4% and median household income of $86,005.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by hurricane, inland flooding and lightning.

A major airport is 4 miles away, giving the area unusually direct access to the national air network.

At a glance

Population
40,592
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$86,005
Top 31% nationally
Density
1,670/sq mi
24.3 sq mi of land
Median age
37.5
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Lafayette
Louisiana
Metro area
Lafayette, LA
Nearest major airport
LFT
4 mi · Lafayette Rgnl/Paul Fournet Fld
Median home value
$305,300
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.4% is lower than 52% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment grew 0.5% over the past year, to 60,611 employed residents.

48% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 86% of measured US ZIP areas.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$8,840$86,005Top 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$3,981$52,135Top 17%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate12.7%Top 40%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute24.6 minBottom 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher48.3%Top 14%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment60,611Top 47%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)1.4%Top 31%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.5%Top 18%June 2026
Labor force63,425Top 47%June 2026
Labor force participation65.8%Top 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$52,120Bottom 2%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$41,780Bottom 2%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)0.2%Top 43%June 2026
Unemployment rate4.4%Bottom 48%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202488k80k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $86,005 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 — Lafayette, LA
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides5,200$21,400
Retail Salespersons5,010$28,600
Registered Nurses4,930$81,960
General and Operations Managers4,590$99,510
Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand4,500$32,600
Fast Food and Counter Workers4,480$22,320

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 does not publish labor-force data for ZIP areas. This is the figure for Lafayette, LA, the city containing this ZIP code.

49% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 59% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 17.2 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
3
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
17.2
across all schools here
Math proficiency
48.9%
Top 16% in Louisiana
Reading proficiency
59.0%
Top 18% in Louisiana
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Milton Elementary SchoolLafayette Parish1,26120.050%64%
O. Comeaux High SchoolLafayette Parish87316.2
Corporal Michael Middlebrook Elementary SchoolLafayette Parish48413.845%47%

46.6% 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 Louisiana’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 $1,239 takes 17% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.5 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
17.3%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.5×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,239
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$305,300
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.55Top 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate61.9%Bottom 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±87019,138Top 4%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$56$1,239Top 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$19,024$305,300Top 32%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income17.3%Bottom 47%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate9.3%Bottom 43%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 →

No building-permit activity is published for this location by the Census Building Permits Survey.

Weather & climate

7 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 92°F and January a low of 44°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 62.8 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 51, in the Moderate band, and about 2 days a year pass 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station LAFAYETTE RGNL AP, 4.2 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND7.1"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index63.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation62.8"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low44°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high92°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10022024 calendar year
Median air quality index51.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing31°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
51
Moderate on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
63
90th percentile index
Days above 100
2
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

25 / 100
Physical resilience

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

LightningModerate
HurricaneHigh
Inland floodingElevated
DroughtModerate
TornadoModerate

Low or minimal exposure: cold wave, heat wave, ice storm, hail, earthquake, strong wind, wildfire, coastal flooding, winter weather, landslide.

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

Lafayette Parish records 6.0 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 18.4 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 18.8 per 100,000 residents in Lafayette Parish.

Homicide
6.0
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
18.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
18.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
16.0
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 Lafayette Parish 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 70508 rather than 70508 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

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

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Lafayette Rgnl/Paul Fournet FldLFT4 mi8,000 ft
Acadiana RgnlARA12 mi8,002 ft
Chennault IntlCWF67 mi10,702 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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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)
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
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.

70508 vs Lafayette

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

70508
Lafayette
Median household income
$86,005
vs
$61,915
Per capita income
$52,135
vs
$40,517
Population density
1,670/sq mi
vs
2,166/sq mi
Median home value
$305,300
vs
$257,000
Median gross rent
$1,239
vs
$1,100
Homeownership rate
61.9%
vs
53.1%
Bachelor's degree or higher
48.3%
vs
41.1%
Poverty rate
12.7%
vs
18.3%
Median age
37.5
vs
36.9

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.