Peabody, Massachusetts

Area Profile

54,695 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Peabody, in Essex County.

59out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 45% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity2177th of 3,904 published cities54
SchoolsTop 49% of 2,668 published cities52
Growth2404th of 2,973 published cities31
Housing affordability3541st of 4,223 published cities57
Climate3059th of 4,223 published cities63
Physical resilienceTop 27% of 4,182 published cities78
AccessTop 21% of 4,226 published cities98
Economic stabilityTop 31% of 4,226 published cities69
The quick read

Residential permitting has slowed: 17 units authorized over the past twelve months, 39% below the prior year.

Buying strains local incomes far more than renting does — the median home is 6.2 times median household income, against a historic benchmark near three — while rent takes 24% of it.

A major airport is 12 miles away, giving the area unusually direct access to the national air network.

At a glance

Population
54,695
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$96,657
Top 21% nationally
Density
3,369/sq mi
16.2 sq mi of land
Median age
45.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Essex County
Massachusetts
Metro area
Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH
Nearest major airport
BOS
12 mi · General Edward Lawrence Logan Intl
Median home value
$596,200
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

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

Employment fell 1.7% over the past year, to 27,929 employed residents.

35% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 76% of measured US cities.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$3,634$96,657Top 21%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,769$51,060Top 16%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate7.7%Bottom 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute28.3 minTop 41%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher35.0%Top 24%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment27,929Bottom 36%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-0.5%Bottom 44%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-1.7%Bottom 27%June 2026
Labor force29,200Bottom 36%June 2026
Labor force participation65.2%Top 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$89,620Top 10%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$66,620Top 10%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)0.0%Bottom 45%June 2026
Unemployment rate4.4%Top 48%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/066.03.0
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 4.4% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202497k84k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $96,657 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 — Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides72,420$40,910
General and Operations Managers70,950$133,800
Registered Nurses64,240$106,180
Retail Salespersons64,150$36,850
Fast Food and Counter Workers60,130$36,290
Janitors and Cleaners, Except Maids and Housekeeping Cleaners43,160$46,550

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.

28% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 37% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 12.4 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
10
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
12.4
across all schools here
Math proficiency
27.9%
Bottom 49% in Massachusetts
Reading proficiency
36.8%
Bottom 35% in Massachusetts
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Peabody Veterans Memorial HighPeabody1,33310.3
J Henry Higgins MiddlePeabody1,32012.525%28%
Thomas CarrollPeabody64514.023%32%
South MemorialPeabody50616.333%44%
William A Welch SrPeabody40814.118%24%
John E. McCarthyPeabody38513.843%53%
Captain Samuel BrownPeabody36910.022%35%
West MemorialPeabody29414.730%55%
John E BurkePeabody29411.342%53%
CenterPeabody12317.628%41%

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 Massachusetts’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 $1,950 takes 24% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 6.2 times median household income here, well above the historic benchmark, at a level conventionally described as seriously unaffordable.

Rent as a share of income
24.2%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
6.2×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,950
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$596,200
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income6.17Top 8%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate65.6%Bottom 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±56523,081Top 2%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$99$1,950Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$12,307$596,200Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income24.2%Top 20%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
31/ 100
Ranks 2404 of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing, 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 2% since 2020, reaching 55,418 in 2024.

Permitting has turned downward after moving the other way the year before.

Population is still rising, but more slowly than in the preceding year.

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

At 0.3 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
17
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.3
Bottom 16% nationally
Year over year
−39%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202455k54k
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
2020202120222023202420253120
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was lower than 2020 (−17%).

Weather & climate

5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 82°F and January a low of 20°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 44.9 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 37, in the Good band, and about 4 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 BEVERLY MUNI AP, 4.3 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.5"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index58.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation44.9"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low20°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high82°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10042024 calendar year
Median air quality index37.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing44°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
37
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
58
90th percentile index
Days above 100
4
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

78 / 100
Physical resilience

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

Coastal floodingHigh
Ice stormModerate
EarthquakeElevated
HurricaneElevated
Heat waveModerate
DroughtModerate

Low or minimal exposure: inland flooding, lightning, tornado, strong wind, cold wave, landslide, wildfire, winter weather, hail.

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.

Essex County records 1.7 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, lower than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 3.5 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 19.4 per 100,000 residents in Essex County.

Homicide
1.7
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
3.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
19.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
7.7
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 Essex 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 Peabody rather than Peabody 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

5 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 12 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
General Edward Lawrence Logan IntlBOS12 mi10,083 ft
Manchester Boston RgnlMHT36 mi9,250 ft
Rhode Island TF Green IntlPVD61 mi8,700 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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Other cities in Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
BostonSuffolk County666,44264vs Peabody
CambridgeMiddlesex County118,79670vs Peabody
LowellMiddlesex County118,36862vs Peabody
BrocktonPlymouth County105,38654vs Peabody
QuincyNorfolk County102,11470vs Peabody
LynnEssex County101,70955vs Peabody
NewtonMiddlesex County89,04475vs Peabody
LawrenceEssex County88,73647vs Peabody
SomervilleMiddlesex County81,03667vs Peabody
FraminghamMiddlesex County72,39966vs Peabody
HaverhillEssex County67,69858vs Peabody
MaldenMiddlesex County65,90665vs Peabody

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.

Compare

Put Peabody side by side with a similar place.

Peabody vs SaugusPeabody vs MilfordPeabody vs Bull RunPeabody vs Weymouth Town

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
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.

ZIP codes in Peabody

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
0196054,474$96,50160