Grafton, Wisconsin
Area Profile
12,445 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Grafton, in Ozaukee County.
Grafton ranks in the top 11% of published city profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 3.1% and median household income of $89,861.
Residential permitting has slowed: 107 units authorized over the past twelve months, 63% below the prior year.
Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published city profiles, placing Grafton in the top 2% for physical resilience.
At a glance
Jobs & opportunity
Unemployment of 3.1% is lower than 94% of the 3,904 measured US cities.
Employment grew 0.4% over the past year, to 48,830 employed residents.
47% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 87% of measured US cities.
| Metric | Value | Compared nationally | Source period |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median household income ±$12,093 | $89,861 | Top 25%of 29,573 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Per capita income ±$2,946 | $47,360 | Top 20%of 31,420 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Poverty rate | 3.7% | Bottom 18%of 31,900 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Average commute | 26.2 min | Bottom 48%of 31,543 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Bachelor's degree or higher | 47.2% | Top 13%of 31,919 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Employment | 48,830 | Top 50%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Employment change (3 years) | -0.9% | Bottom 35%of 3,903 | June 2026 |
| Employment change (year over year) | 0.4% | Top 22%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Labor force | 50,407 | Top 50%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Labor force participation | 68.7% | Top 22%of 31,933 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Mean annual wage | $67,440 | Bottom 47%of 3,658 | 2025 OEWS |
| Median annual wage | $51,160 | Bottom 48%of 3,658 | 2025 OEWS |
| Unemployment change (year over year) | 0.0% | Bottom 45%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Unemployment rate | 3.1% | Bottom 6%of 3,904 | June 2026 |
| Occupation | People employed | Median annual wage |
|---|---|---|
| Home Health and Personal Care Aides | 30,090 | $37,020 |
| Registered Nurses | 22,400 | $97,360 |
| Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand | 19,810 | $44,840 |
| Retail Salespersons | 18,850 | $34,410 |
| Fast Food and Counter Workers | 17,490 | $28,440 |
| Cashiers | 15,050 | $30,400 |
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 publishes city-level labor data only for places of 25,000 or more. This is the figure for Ozaukee County, WI, which contains this city.
Schools
How it’s calculated →66% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 55% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.
There are 15.7 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.
| School | District | Students | Per teacher | Math | Reading |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grafton High | Grafton School District | 727 | 15.8 | — | — |
| Kennedy Elementary | Grafton School District | 507 | 16.4 | 76% | 54% |
| Woodview Elementary | Grafton School District | 506 | 14.9 | 74% | 53% |
| John Long Middle | Grafton School District | 452 | 15.6 | 47% | 57% |
15.6% 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 Wisconsin’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 →Prices for everything a household buys run about 4% below the national average, on the Bureau of Economic Analysis index. Housing drives most of that difference.
Median rent of $1,310 takes 17% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.
A median home costs 3.7 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.
Prices here run about 4% below the national average. The spread between places is driven mostly by housing — goods vary far less — and this excludes taxes.
| Metric | Value | Compared nationally | Source period |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost of living index | 95.7 | Bottom 29%of 3,658 | 2023 |
| Home price to income | 3.66 | Top 33%of 28,473 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Homeownership rate | 61.3% | Bottom 22%of 31,843 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Housing units ±286 | 5,769 | Top 10%of 32,330 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Median gross rent ±$141 | $1,310 | Top 27%of 23,432 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Median home value ±$13,054 | $328,800 | Top 25%of 29,342 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Rent as a share of income | 17.5% | Bottom 42%of 23,201 | 2024 ACS 5-Year |
| Vacancy rate | 3.4% | Bottom 21%of 32,001 | 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 →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 5% since 2020, reaching 12,741 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 8.6 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US cities.
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 17°F.
Normal annual precipitation is 34.6 inches, including 48.7 inches of snow.
Air quality measures a median index of 37, in the Good band, and about 9 days a year pass 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.
| Metric | Value | Source period |
|---|---|---|
| 90th percentile air quality index | 61.0 | 2024 calendar year |
| Annual precipitation | 34.6" | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Annual snowfall | 48.7" | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Average January low | 17°F | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Average July high | 82°F | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Comfortable months | 5 | 1991-2020 Normals |
| Days above AQI 100 | 9 | 2024 calendar year |
| Median air quality index | 37.0 | 2024 calendar year |
| Seasonal temperature swing | 49°F | 1991-2020 Normals |
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
The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are hail and lightning.
Overall hazard risk is lower than 72% of measured US cities.
Low or minimal exposure: cold wave, tornado, inland flooding, heat wave, winter weather, strong wind, coastal flooding, earthquake, drought, ice storm, wildfire, landslide, hurricane.
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.
Safety
How it’s measured →Below these are deaths rather than offences, published for the county. The two measure different things and are not comparable with each other.
Grafton's police department reported 70 violent offences per 100,000 residents, lower than most places with a department reporting. Property crime runs at 565.
Ozaukee County records 2.0 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 11.4 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.
Drug overdose deaths run at 9.6 per 100,000 residents in Ozaukee County.
Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.
Offences are reported to the FBI by Grafton’s own police department, for the population it serves, and are shown only where it reported every month of the year — a partial year is withheld rather than scaled up. Reported crime counts what was reported to and recorded by police, which is not the same as what happened, and a place that draws a large daytime workforce carries incidents its residents did not generate. Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Ozaukee 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 Grafton rather than Grafton 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.
- Taxes
- Taxes are not published: no source covers them nationally with a method open enough to check. Cost of living now is — the index above is the Bureau of Economic Analysis price parity for this area — but it is a price level for all consumption rather than a budget for a household, its spread is driven mostly by housing, and it excludes taxes. Housing affordability is computed separately from rent, price and income, because that answers a narrower and more actionable question. Nothing here is individualised tax advice.
- Anything about a specific address
- Every figure describes an area, not a street or a house. School attendance zones, insurance pricing and the character of a neighbourhood all vary within the places measured here.
Access
5 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 55 miles away.
| Airport | Code | Distance | Longest runway |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wittman Rgnl | OSH | 55 mi | 8,002 ft |
| Appleton Intl | ATW | 71 mi | 8,003 ft |
| Dane County Rgnl/Truax Fld | MSN | 71 mi | 9,006 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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Other cities in Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI
Same metropolitan area, measured the same way| City | County | Population | Area Score | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Milwaukee | Milwaukee County | 566,973 | 54 | vs Grafton |
| Waukesha | Waukesha County | 71,233 | 73 | vs Grafton |
| West Allis | Milwaukee County | 59,612 | 66 | vs Grafton |
| Wauwatosa | Milwaukee County | 48,529 | 72 | vs Grafton |
| Brookfield | Waukesha County | 41,273 | 75 | vs Grafton |
| New Berlin | Waukesha County | 40,270 | 73 | vs Grafton |
| Menomonee Falls | Waukesha County | 39,539 | 80 | vs Grafton |
| Greenfield | Milwaukee County | 37,345 | — | vs Grafton |
| Oak Creek | Milwaukee County | 37,325 | 73 | vs Grafton |
| Franklin | Milwaukee County | 35,886 | 76 | vs Grafton |
| West Bend | Washington County | 32,030 | 73 | vs Grafton |
| Muskego | Waukesha County | 25,406 | 78 | vs Grafton |
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.
Similar places
Matched on AreaProfile signals, not geographyCompare
Put Grafton side by side with a similar place.
Data & methodology
| Used for | Source | Source period | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Access | Federal Aviation Administration Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service | NASR current cycle | 28-day NASR cycle |
| safety | Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime Data Explorer Summarized offense counts by law enforcement agency | 2025 calendar year | Annually, with monthly revisions |
| Physical risk | Federal Emergency Management Agency National Risk Index | National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0) | Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current) |
| Climate | NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly) | 1991-2020 Normals | Every ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period) |
| Housing | U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis Regional price parities and county personal income | 2023 | Annually, each December |
| Jobs | U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Local Area Unemployment Statistics | June 2026 | Monthly |
| Jobs | U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics | 2025 OEWS | Annual (spring release) |
| Demographics, Housing, Income, Jobs | U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File) | 2024 ACS 5-Year | Annual (5-year estimates released each December) |
| Development | U.S. Census Bureau Building Permits Survey | 12 months ending July 2026 | Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month |
| Demographics | U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program | July 1, 2024 estimate | Annual (vintage released each spring) |
| safety | U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics Provisional county-level mortality by intent | April, 2025 to March, 2026 | Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years |
| schools | U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments | 2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school year | Directory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them |
| Climate | U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System Daily Air Quality Index by county | 2024 calendar year | Annually, 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 Grafton
1 published ZIP profiles| ZIP | Population | Median household income | Area Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 53024 | 18,982 | $92,390 | 79 |