29118Orangeburg, South Carolina

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 29118.

59out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 48% of 5,298 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity4653rd of 6,210 published ZIP areas43
GrowthTop 32% of 5,428 published ZIP areas61
Housing affordabilityTop 15% of 6,685 published ZIP areas98
ClimateTop 26% of 6,789 published ZIP areas77
Physical resilience4873rd of 6,709 published ZIP areas35
Access5115th of 6,791 published ZIP areas83
Economic stability5355th of 6,742 published ZIP areas41
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published ZIP profiles: unemployment is 6.0% and the Opportunity signal places 29118 in the bottom 25%.

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.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by hurricane, earthquake and tornado.

At a glance

Population
15,135
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$64,167
Bottom 37% nationally
Density
198/sq mi
76.6 sq mi of land
Median age
41.9
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Orangeburg
South Carolina
Metro area
Orangeburg, SC
Nearest major airport
CAE
29 mi · Columbia Metro
Median home value
$176,600
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 6.0% is lower than 8% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment grew 0.9% over the past year, to 33,196 employed residents.

35% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 74% of measured US ZIP areas.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$8,142$64,167Bottom 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$3,314$33,278Bottom 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate13.6%Top 37%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute29.2 minTop 42%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher35.4%Top 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment33,196Bottom 34%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-1.3%Bottom 28%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.9%Top 13%June 2026
Labor force35,305Bottom 34%June 2026
Labor force participation57.5%Bottom 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)-0.5%Bottom 18%June 2026
Unemployment rate6.0%Top 8%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202464k54k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $64,167 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 Orangeburg, SC, the city containing this ZIP code.

There are 17.0 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
4
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
17.0
across all schools here
Math proficiency
Reading proficiency
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Orangeburg Wilkinson HighOrangeburg99216.5
Marshall ElementaryOrangeburg62516.4
Orangeburg High School for Health Professions · charterLimestone Charters Association49218.9
The Orangeburg Career & Technology CenterOrangeburg 810

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 South Carolina’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 $1,016 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
19.0%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.8×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,016
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$176,600
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income2.75Bottom 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate64.4%Bottom 21%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±4576,880Top 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$101$1,016Top 50%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$17,315$176,600Bottom 38%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income19.0%Top 41%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate10.7%Bottom 48%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
61/ 100
Top 32% 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.

61% of recently permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes, so new supply is concentrated in apartments and condominiums rather than detached houses.

At 2.5 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US ZIP areas.

Units permitted
33
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
2.5
Bottom 46% nationally
Year over year
+200%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
60.6%
units in 5+ unit buildings

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

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 37°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 43.7 inches.

30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station ORANGEBURG MUNI AP, 7.6 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND5.0"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation43.7"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low37°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high92°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing35°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

35 / 100
Physical resilience

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

HurricaneElevated
EarthquakeModerate
Ice stormModerate
LightningModerate
TornadoModerate
LandslideModerate

Low or minimal exposure: strong wind, heat wave, wildfire, drought, hail, inland flooding, cold wave, winter weather.

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.

Orangeburg County records 24.1 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, higher than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 38.6 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 25.4 per 100,000 residents in Orangeburg County.

Homicide
24.1
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
38.6
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
25.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
20.5
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 Orangeburg 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 29118 rather than 29118 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

2 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 29 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Columbia MetroCAE29 mi8,601 ft
Augusta Rgnl At Bush FldAGS64 mi8,001 ft
Savannah/Hilton Head IntlSAV101 mi9,351 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
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
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.

29118 vs Orangeburg

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

29118
Orangeburg
Median household income
$64,167
vs
$38,635
Per capita income
$33,278
vs
$19,990
Population density
198/sq mi
vs
1,471/sq mi
Median home value
$176,600
vs
$163,500
Median gross rent
$1,016
vs
$848
Homeownership rate
64.4%
vs
44.6%
Bachelor's degree or higher
35.4%
vs
26.3%
Poverty rate
13.6%
vs
32.6%
Median age
41.9
vs
36.4

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.