East Palo Alto, CA population, income and ZIP codes

East Palo Alto city is a small city in California, with 29,143 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #276 of 1,618 ranked by population — larger than 82% of them. The median age here is 34.2 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly younger profile than the country as a whole. Places under 65,000 residents only appear in the five-year release, never the one-year file, so these values pool sixty months of responses and lag the current year by design.

Households in East Palo Alto city earn a median of $104,832 a year, 33.5% above the national figure of $78,538 and 15% above the $91,111 median for the 1,050 California cities we cover. The median is the midpoint household, not an average, so a handful of very high earners cannot drag it upward the way they distort a mean. Poverty reaches 9.7% of residents here, below the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in East Palo Alto city is valued at $1,124,000, 270.5% above the national figure and 91% above the $589,600 peer median, while median gross rent runs $2,209 a month, 57.1% above the national figure, or roughly $26,508 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 25.3% of gross pay toward that rent against the federal 30% cost-burden threshold, so renting here is within the standard affordability guideline. The home-price-to-income ratio works out to 10.7×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is out of reach on local earnings alone and the ownership market leans on outside income, equity or dual high earners. 47.9% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, so the market leans more heavily on renters. Rent is reported gross — contract rent plus tenant-paid utilities — which is why it runs above the advertised price on a listing for the same unit.

Home values sit at 10.7× median household income, far past the 3.9× national mark, so ownership costs here are set by something other than local wages — second homes, retirees with equity, or commuters earning elsewhere.

All values below were released by the Census for this exact geography, with no gap-filling on our side. Small-area estimates still carry wider margins of error than state or national figures, so check the linked ACS tables before relying on them for lending, appraisal or legal work.