55362Monticello, Minnesota

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 55362.

68out of 100
Area Score
Top 24% of 5,298 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity3757th of 6,210 published ZIP areas50
SchoolsTop 20% of 4,422 published ZIP areas75
GrowthTop 7% of 5,428 published ZIP areas77
Housing affordabilityTop 32% of 6,685 published ZIP areas90
Climate6702nd of 6,789 published ZIP areas51
Physical resilienceTop 35% of 6,709 published ZIP areas70
Access5980th of 6,791 published ZIP areas70
Economic stabilityTop 3% of 6,742 published ZIP areas86
The quick read

Unemployment is 4.6% and median household income $91,832, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published ZIP profiles.

In the public schools here, 59% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 14.8 students for every teacher.

Development activity is both elevated and accelerating — 82 housing units permitted over the past twelve months, up 95% on the prior year.

At a glance

Population
20,663
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$91,832
Top 25% nationally
Density
316/sq mi
65.3 sq mi of land
Median age
35.0
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Monticello
Minnesota
Metro area
Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI
Nearest major airport
MSP
42 mi · Minneapolis-St Paul Intl/Wold-Chamberlain
Median home value
$350,200
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.6% is lower than 43% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment fell 1.7% over the past year, to 82,698 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$6,975$91,832Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$3,805$44,432Top 28%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate5.3%Bottom 21%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute28.9 minTop 44%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher26.3%Top 42%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment82,698Top 39%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)0.1%Top 49%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-1.7%Bottom 28%June 2026
Labor force86,671Top 39%June 2026
Labor force participation73.0%Top 9%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$74,580Top 25%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$59,320Top 19%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)0.8%Top 15%June 2026
Unemployment rate4.6%Top 43%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202493k84k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $91,832 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 — Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Home Health and Personal Care Aides93,560$38,860
Retail Salespersons51,180$36,670
General and Operations Managers44,890$103,570
Registered Nurses43,600$103,040
Customer Service Representatives38,630$49,480
Fast Food and Counter Workers37,920$33,040

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 Monticello, MN, the city containing this ZIP code.

59% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 63% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 14.8 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
16
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
14.8
across all schools here
Math proficiency
58.9%
Top 23% in Minnesota
Reading proficiency
62.6%
Top 20% in Minnesota
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Monticello Senior HighMonticello Public School District1,31320.5
Monticello MiddleMonticello Public School District86017.647%57%
Pinewood ElementaryMonticello Public School District79415.064%61%
Little Mountain ElementaryMonticello Public School District57613.757%63%
Eastview Education CenterMonticello Public School District3017.2
Swan River Montessori Charter Sch · charterSwan River Montessori Charter Sch16113.490%90%
Eastview Elementary School - SNWSherburne and Northern Wright Speci6811.3
Monticello Nature Based EducationMonticello Public School District6590%84%
SNW Transitions ProgramSherburne and Northern Wright Speci3913.0
Monticello Alternative ProgramMonticello Public School District246.0
Monticello Middle School - SNWSherburne and Northern Wright Speci144.7
Monticello High School - SNWSherburne and Northern Wright Speci147.0

29.3% 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 Minnesota’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 $1,402 takes 18% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.8 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
18.3%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.8×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,402
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$350,200
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.81Top 32%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate73.8%Bottom 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±3397,905Top 20%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$141$1,402Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$9,754$350,200Top 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income18.3%Top 45%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate2.1%Bottom 9%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
77/ 100
Top 7% 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 5.5 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US ZIP areas.

Units permitted
82
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
5.5
Top 27% nationally
Year over year
+95%
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 Monticello, MN, the city containing this ZIP code.

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 3°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 28.5 inches, including 47.9 inches of snow.

Air quality measures a median index of 41, in the Good band, and about 3 days a year pass 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

-10°10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station ST CLOUD RGNL AP, 19.5 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.0"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index58.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation28.5"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall47.9"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low3°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high82°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10032024 calendar year
Median air quality index41.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing58°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
41
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
58
90th percentile index
Days above 100
3
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

70 / 100
Physical resilience

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

Strong windElevated
HailElevated
TornadoModerate
Inland floodingModerate
Heat waveModerate
LightningModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, wildfire, ice storm, landslide, cold wave, drought, earthquake.

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.

Wright County records 1.5 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 7.3 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 6.1 per 100,000 residents in Wright County.

Homicide
1.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
7.3
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
6.1
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
9.3
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 Wright 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 55362 rather than 55362 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

1 major airport lies within 100 miles, the nearest 42 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Minneapolis-St Paul Intl/Wold-ChamberlainMSP42 mi11,006 ft
Rochester IntlRST117 mi9,034 ft
Chippewa Valley RgnlEAU119 mi8,101 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
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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)
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.

55362 vs Monticello

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

55362
Monticello
Median household income
$91,832
vs
$79,534
Per capita income
$44,432
vs
$37,838
Population density
316/sq mi
vs
1,625/sq mi
Median home value
$350,200
vs
$323,700
Median gross rent
$1,402
vs
$1,405
Homeownership rate
73.8%
vs
64.7%
Bachelor's degree or higher
26.3%
vs
23.5%
Poverty rate
5.3%
vs
6.7%
Median age
35.0
vs
34.1

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.