Orono, ME population, income and ZIP codes

Orono CDP is a mid-size town in Maine, with 10,699 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #13 of 155 ranked by population — larger than 92% of them. The median age here is 21.7 years against 39.1 nationally, a distinctly younger profile, typical of places with students, military posts or a fast-growing family population. 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 Orono CDP earn a median of $56,890 a year, 27.6% below the national figure of $78,538 and 4% below the $58,992 median for the 106 Maine 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 28.2% of residents here, well above the 12.4% national rate, which is the single clearest signal in this dataset that median income here is carried by a narrow band of households.

The typical owner-occupied home in Orono CDP is valued at $219,200, 27.8% below the national figure and within a couple of points of the $221,600 peer median, while median gross rent runs $1,150 a month, 18.2% below the national figure, or roughly $13,800 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 24.3% 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 3.9×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is easier here than in the average US market. 43.9% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, a renter-majority market, so rent figures matter more here than the home-value line. 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.

A median age of 21.7 means a large student or early-career population; income medians in places like this understate household resources, since many residents are supported from outside the address.

No figure on this page is estimated by us; each one comes straight from the published ACS tables for this area. 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.