Hastings, Nebraska

Area Profile

25,008 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Hastings, in Adams County.

54out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 28% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity2108th of 3,904 published cities54
SchoolsTop 46% of 2,668 published cities55
Growth2089th of 2,973 published cities38
Housing affordabilityTop 8% of 4,223 published cities100
Climate3530th of 4,223 published cities60
Physical resilience3193rd of 4,182 published cities30
Access4141st of 4,226 published cities41
Economic stability2376th of 4,226 published cities57
The quick read

Residential permitting has slowed: 65 units authorized over the past twelve months, 76% below the prior year.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 16% of median household income and the median home is 2.9 times it.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by hail, tornado and strong wind.

At a glance

Population
25,008
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$64,048
Bottom 46% nationally
Density
1,677/sq mi
14.9 sq mi of land
Median age
37.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Adams County
Nebraska
Metro area
Hastings, NE
Nearest major airport
LNK
87 mi · Lincoln
Median home value
$184,700
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.0% is lower than 96% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment fell 3.0% over the past year, to 13,345 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$4,817$64,048Bottom 46%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,414$36,004Top 43%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate14.8%Top 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute15.4 minBottom 6%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher29.2%Top 32%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment13,345Bottom 10%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-1.0%Bottom 31%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-3.0%Bottom 8%June 2026
Labor force13,761Bottom 9%June 2026
Labor force participation67.7%Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.0%Bottom 45%June 2026
Unemployment rate3.0%Bottom 4%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/063.31.8
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 3.0% 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
202120222023202464k55k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $64,048 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.

44% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 46% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 13.8 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
13
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
13.8
across all schools here
Math proficiency
44.2%
Top 50% in Nebraska
Reading proficiency
46.5%
Top 50% in Nebraska
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
HASTINGS SENIOR HIGH SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS99114.6
HASTINGS MIDDLE SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS75712.447%47%
ADAMS CENTRAL ELEMENTARY SCHOOLADAMS CENTRAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS50614.963%63%
MORTON EARLY LEARNING CENTERHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS50145.5
ADAMS CENTRAL JR-SR HIGH SCHADAMS CENTRAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS45212.242%47%
HAWTHORNE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS34311.848%43%
RAYMOND A WATSON ELEM SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS33612.942%42%
LONGFELLOW ELEMENTARY SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS30512.239%45%
LINCOLN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS28910.328%35%
ALCOTT ELEMENTARY SCHOOLHASTINGS PUBLIC SCHOOLS26711.627%38%
WEST HASTINGS HIGH SCHOOLWEST HASTINGS SCHOOL227.3
ESU #9 PRESCHOOL HOME BASE PRGEDUCATIONAL SERVICE UNIT 090

44.2% 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 Nebraska’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 $858 takes 16% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.9 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
16.1%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.9×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$858
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$184,700
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income2.88Bottom 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate65.1%Bottom 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±10911,408Top 5%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$53$858Bottom 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$12,528$184,700Bottom 49%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income16.1%Bottom 32%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate6.4%Bottom 35%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
38/ 100
Ranks 2089 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 been broadly flat since 2020, at 25,152 in 2024.

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

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

At 2.6 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
65
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
2.6
Top 47% nationally
Year over year
−76%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202425k25k
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
20202021202220232024202521126
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was higher than 2020 (+152%).

Weather & climate

5 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 88°F and January a low of 16°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 26.4 inches.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station HASTINGS MUNI AP, 2.0 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.3"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation26.4"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low16°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high88°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months51991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing51°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

30 / 100
Physical resilience

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

HailHigh
Strong windHigh
DroughtModerate
LightningElevated
Ice stormModerate
TornadoHigh
Heat waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, wildfire, inland flooding, earthquake, cold wave, landslide.

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.

Adams County records 0.0 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 16.4 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 5.5 per 100,000 residents in Adams County.

Homicide
0.0
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
16.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
5.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
32.4
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 Adams 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 Hastings rather than Hastings 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 87 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
LincolnLNK87 mi8,649 ft
North Platte Rgnl/Lee Bird FldLBF125 mi8,001 ft
Eppley AirfieldOMA139 mi9,502 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
54
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Compare

Put Hastings side by side with a similar place.

Hastings vs NorfolkHastings vs FairmontHastings vs GilletteHastings vs Marshall

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.

ZIP codes in Hastings

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
6890126,264$66,58553