City safety & data profile

Rancho Santa MargaritaCA

Rancho Santa Margarita, CA is a 49K-resident city in Orange County with a median household income of $152,560.

Orange County, California. Federal health, economic, and safety indicators for Rancho Santa Margarita, drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey, CDC PLACES, and CMS Hospital Compare. Rancho Santa Margarita has a population larger than 79% of the 4,640 U.S. cities Areazine tracks, and a median home value of $971,200.

Data updated 2026-09-03

49K
Population (place)
Top 21%
By size
$152,560
Median income (place)
$971,200
Median home (place)
5.7%
Poverty rate (place)
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The read on Rancho Santa Margarita

Rancho Santa Margarita posts a median household income higher than 93% of U.S. cities Areazine tracks.

Top 7%
by median income, US cities

Where Rancho Santa Margarita income ranks nationally

Median household income vs. every place Areazine profiles (place-level ACS)

$152,560 Top 7% higher than 93% of 3,889 places Areazine profiles

Rancho Santa Margarita $0 $260,000 every profiled place, bucketed by value

Each bar is a $20K-wide band; taller bars hold more places Areazine profiles. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.

Source U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (place-level) · 2024 ACS 5-year

Largest cities in CA

Population among 482 CA places with 10,000+ residents and ACS income on Areazine. Tooltip shows the income rank in the same pool.

residents

What this shows Los Angeles is the largest CA city on this list; Alamo leads median income.

Source U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (place-level) As of 2024 ACS 5-year

Highest median incomes in CA

Median household income among the same 482-city pool. Tooltip shows the population rank.

median

What this shows Alamo posts the highest place-level median income in CA; Los Angeles is largest by headcount.

Source U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (place-level) As of 2024 ACS 5-year

The quick read

Reading Rancho Santa Margarita, CA beyond the headline numbers

Rancho Santa Margarita sits inside Orange County, California, at roughly 33.64°N, -117.60°W. Population 49,324, $152,560 median household income. Median home value $971,200, median rent $2,625. Poverty rate 5.7%, read against that income figure since two cities on the same median can differ underneath it.

Hardship is low by national standards: 5.7% of Rancho Santa Margarita, CA residents live below the poverty line, in the least-affected quarter of the 3,890 cities reporting a rate.

The median home in Rancho Santa Margarita costs around 6.4 times what a median household earns in a year -- the most expensive quarter of reporting cities, and far enough ahead of local pay that ownership is largely closed to median earners.

25.4% of Rancho Santa Margarita workers report working from home, the highest quarter of reporting cities. Where that share runs this high, local income increasingly reflects employers located somewhere else.

Among the CDC measures on this page, obesity departs furthest from its peer median: 24.1% in Rancho Santa Margarita, the lowest-prevalence quarter of the 3,759 cities reporting that measure.

Public transit carries 0.1% of Rancho Santa Margarita workers, a smaller share than at least three quarters of reporting cities.

Sources: U.S. Census ACS, CDC PLACES, CMS Hospital Compare, plus live alerts for Rancho Santa Margarita from FEMA, NOAA, FDA, and CPSC. Economic comparison bars use the unweighted average across tracked Census places with a reported value, not a household-weighted national median.

Population (place)
49,324
Rancho Santa Margarita · Census Place
Median Income (place)
$152,560
+71% vs avg
Median Home Value (place)
$971,200
+135% vs avg
Median Age (place)
40.9
years · ACS place

10-Year Trends 2013–2024

County-level trend (Orange County): Rancho Santa Margarita's own historical series isn't separately published by the Census Bureau, so these year-over-year figures track the surrounding county, not the city alone.

20132024
Population
3.2M+4%
Median Income
$116,289+54%
Median Home Value
$962,600+85%
Poverty Rate
9.5%-23%
Unemployment
5.4%-43%

Economics

Economics indicators for Rancho Santa Margarita, CA
IndicatorValue
Median Rent
$2,625/mo
Poverty Rate
5.7% -54% vs avg
Unemployment 4.1%
Bachelor's Degree+ 49.7%
Work From Home 25.4%
Public Transit 0.1%

Population

White 61.7%
African American 1.6%
Asian 12.6%
Two or More Ethnicities 3.8%

Health Profile 15 measures

Health Indicators

Short Sleep Duration
33.8%
High Blood Pressure
26.4%
Obesity
24.1%
Physical Inactivity
18.6%
Binge Drinking
17.6%
Frequent Mental Distress
16.6%
Frequent Physical Distress
11.3%
Current Asthma
9.8%
Diabetes
9%
Current Smoking
8.6%

Preventive Care

Dental Visit 71.4%
Annual Checkup 73.4%

Other Measures

Lack of Health Insurance
5.6%
Coronary Heart Disease
4.4%
Stroke
2.4%

What alerts and safety updates affect Rancho Santa Margarita?

No area-tagged alerts are on record for Rancho Santa Margarita right now. New federal and counterpart-agency notices still land in the site feed as agencies publish them.

City alert dispatch desk

Sheet CA-RANCHO-SANTA-MARGARIT · Rancho Santa Margarita

Rancho Santa Margarita: no area-tagged alerts on record — state hubs carry the live CAP stream.

  • FEED-QUIET No tagged alerts
  • LEAD-NONE Feed idle
  • DESK-IDLE Awaiting feed

Counts reflect published articles tagged to Rancho Santa Margarita; untagged NOAA county warnings may still appear in the site feed. Browse California state hubs · Methodology

Read with this city profile

Tracking Safety Alerts in Your Area

How Areazine tags Rancho Santa Margarita in the CAP feed
All safety guides →

Frequently Asked Questions 5

What is the population of Rancho Santa Margarita, CA? ▼
Rancho Santa Margarita, CA has a population of 49,324 people, located in Orange County, California.
What is the median household income in Rancho Santa Margarita? ▼
The median household income in Rancho Santa Margarita, CA is $152,560 per year, per the U.S. Census ACS. The poverty rate is 5.7%.
What is the median home value in Rancho Santa Margarita? ▼
The median home value in Rancho Santa Margarita, CA is $971,200. Median rent is $2,625/month.
What are the top health concerns in Rancho Santa Margarita? ▼
The top health indicators in Rancho Santa Margarita include Short Sleep Duration (33.8%), High Blood Pressure (26.4%), Obesity (24.1%). Data from CDC PLACES.
What is the median age in Rancho Santa Margarita? ▼
The median age in Rancho Santa Margarita, CA is 40.9 years. 49.7% of residents have a bachelor's degree or higher.

Nationwide cities with similar poverty or income 8

Two ACS-derived peer sets for Rancho Santa Margarita, both outside California so the neighborhoods are not the geographic nearby list below.

Similar poverty rate

Nearest place-level ACS poverty rates outside CA (5.7% here).

McKinney, TX 5.7% Cary, NC 5.7% Lee's Summit, MO 5.7% Schaumburg, IL 5.7%

Similar median income

Nearest place-level ACS median household incomes outside CA ($152,560 here).

Nesconset, NY $152,500 Dardenne Prairie, MO $152,500 Franconia, VA $152,474 Ringwood, NJ $152,414

Compare Rancho Santa Margarita with another city

Pick a second U.S. city to open a side-by-side profile on population, income, health, and hospitals, the same federal datasets as this page.

Quick picks:

Nearby Cities 8

Coto De Caza, CA 15K Foothill Ranch, CA 12K Ladera Ranch, CA 23K Mission Viejo, CA 97K Lake Forest, CA 82K Laguna Hills, CA 32K Laguna Woods, CA 16K Aliso Viejo, CA 50K
All cities in California → Compare Rancho Santa Margarita vs Coto De Caza → All comparisons → Browse all cities

Using Rancho Santa Margarita's profile

Use this as a starting research checklist, not a verdict on whether to live here.

  • Check live recalls, weather and hazard alerts scoped to the Rancho Santa Margarita area before relying on national headlines. Check your area
  • Read the poverty rate alongside the income figure, two places with the same median can have very different realities.
  • Compare Rancho Santa Margarita against California peers on any ranking lens. Explore California

Population and economics (income, home value, poverty, education) are place-level U.S. Census ACS; health is CDC PLACES; hospital counts reflect facilities in and around the city. County-level trends are labeled when shown.

Data Sources

All data on this page comes from official U.S. government sources. Population and economic data from the Census Bureau American Community Survey (2024 5-year estimates, place geography). Health data from the CDC PLACES program (2023). Hospital ratings from CMS Hospital Compare (2024). Climate data from NOAA. Education data from NCES. Cost of living from Bureau of Economic Analysis. Crime statistics, where referenced on Areazine, originate from the FBI Crime Data Explorer. Housing market figures referenced on Areazine come from HUD Fair Market Rents. Census economics and population are at place geography; some health and hospital indicators are reported at the county level (Orange County) where that is the smallest published unit.

Every figure on Areazine is published directly from official U.S. government sources, no number is typed in by an editor. City demographic and health figures are compiled directly from U.S. Census (place-level ACS), CDC, and CMS releases, updated quarterly within 30 days of upstream release. County-level trends are labeled when shown. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026.