ZIP code 50144

ZIP 50144 is a small town in Decatur County, Iowa, with 2,715 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #220 of 970 ranked by population — larger than 77% of them. The median age here is 38.4 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly younger profile than the country as a whole. At this population the ACS sample is small, so the margin of error around every dollar figure below is wide — treat the numbers as a band, not a point, and expect them to move between annual releases without the place itself changing.

Households in ZIP 50144 earn a median of $64,511 a year, 17.9% below the national figure of $78,538. Median household income counts every pre-tax dollar arriving at an address — wages, self-employment, Social Security, pensions, interest and public assistance — for everyone living there, so multi-earner households pull the figure up even where individual pay is modest. Poverty reaches 5.6% of residents here, less than half the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in ZIP 50144 is valued at $122,200, 59.7% below the national figure, while median gross rent runs $544 a month, 61.3% below the national figure, or roughly $6,528 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 10.1% of gross pay toward that rent against the federal 30% cost-burden threshold, so renting here is cheap relative to what people here earn. The home-price-to-income ratio works out to 1.9×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so purchase prices are unusually low against local pay, the pattern in places where supply is plentiful and wage growth has been flat. 63.8% 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.

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.

ZIP 50144 is tabulated inside Decatur County, Iowa, one of 7 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 970 across Iowa. Population sits in the small-town band, typically one main street plus the addresses that feed into it. County assignment on this page follows the largest share of the ZIP's land area, which matters where a delivery route crosses a county line: mail addressed to 50144 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 50144 reports a median household income of $64,511, 26% above the $51,111 county median, and 9% below the $71,182 typical IA ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $122,200, 36% above the county figure and 19% below the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $544 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

Iowa charges 6% statewide, and local governments overlapping 50144 may add county, city or special-district levies on top. We publish the state floor for this ZIP rather than guessing a combined figure, because ZIP boundaries and taxing-district boundaries were drawn for different purposes and do not line up.

Everything above comes from the Census Bureau American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates for this ZIP Code Tabulation Area, with sales tax rates traced to the state revenue agency. Five-year estimates pool sixty months of responses, so they are stable enough to compare 50144 with its neighbours but always trail the current year, and any value the Census suppressed for sample size is shown as unpublished rather than filled in with a model.