South Lake Tahoe, CA population, income and ZIP codes

South Lake Tahoe city is a mid-size town in California, with 21,319 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #340 of 1,618 ranked by population — larger than 79% of them. The median age here is 39.3 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly older 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 South Lake Tahoe city earn a median of $73,940 a year, 5.9% below the national figure of $78,538 and 19% below 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 12.4% of residents here, below the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in South Lake Tahoe city is valued at $630,200, 107.7% above the national figure and 7% above the $589,600 peer median, while median gross rent runs $1,467 a month, 4.3% above the national figure, or roughly $17,604 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 23.8% 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 8.5×, 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. 46.1% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, so the market leans more heavily on renters. The rent line includes utilities paid by the tenant, a definition worth remembering when comparing it against a landlord's quoted rate.

Home values sit at 8.5× 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.

Every value on this page is published directly by the Census for this area — nothing is modelled or interpolated. 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.