You know what one of the best things about Oklahoma is? It has the lowest overall cost of living out of all 50 states (and D.C.), according to the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center’s (MERIC) Cost of Living Data Series. Of course, this does not mean Oklahoma is free of any wealthy residents or wealthy towns.
Recently, a series of data-based studies have been analyzing states, identifying their richest cities based on data from the Census Bureau’s 2023 American Community Survey. This study analyzed 846 cities — what the Census Bureau designates as “places” — in Oklahoma that had complete data from the Census Bureau, in terms of their median household income, mean (average) household income, median home value, and median property taxes paid per year, to come up with a list of the 15 richest cities in the state.
Read on to find out what the richest city in Oklahoma is, plus the top 15 wealthiest cities in the state overall.
What Are the Richest Cities in Oklahoma?
In order to compile this list of the richest cities in Oklahoma, relevant financial data from the Census Bureau’s 2023 American Community Survey was sourced. Wielding these datasets, this study put together a four-factor scoring system to help identify the wealthiest cities in Oklahoma:
- Median household income
- Mean (average) household income
- Median home value
- Median property taxes paid
There are a few important conditions and provisos about what the Census Bureau does with its data. For a number of factors, the Census figures have upper limits, so there’s no exact value for certain factors. For example, for median household income, the Census Bureau has an upper limit of “$250,000+”. For median home value, the upper limit is “$2,000,000+”. For median property taxes paid, the upper limit is “$10,000+”. For these reasons, the mean household income (which is the same as average household income) dataset is crucial because the Census Bureau has exact figures for it. All four of these metrics were scored, added up, and then ranked by the cities’ combined scores.
Another aspect of the Census to point out is the census-designated place — CDP. The Census, more or less, treats CDPs as cities — their terminology is “place” — and so will this list of the richest cities in Oklahoma. But if you see cities on this list that you see as, say, neighborhoods, you’re not wrong; they just happen to be treated as cities by the Census Bureau.
You’ll find a table detailing the top 15 richest cities in Oklahoma and their respective dollar figures for each metric, below:
The No. 1 richest city in Oklahoma in this ranking is Lake Aluma, a small little square-shaped town northeast of Oklahoma City. This place has only 29 households in total. Like so many lakeside towns, this one is wealthy and has beautiful homes on the lakefront. This is the only town in Oklahoma where the median household income exceeded $250,000. The average household income is the second highest in the state, at $333,152. Just under 57% of households here earn a minimum of $200,000 per year. The median home value is north of $1 million, which is absurdly high for Oklahoma considering most of the wealthiest cities on this list don’t have home values that exceed $500,000. Finally, the median property tax paid per household is $8,250.
The No. 2 richest place in Oklahoma is Nichols Hills is an upscale residential and shopping area, northwest of downtown Oklahoma City. This suburb is much larger than Lake Aluma, containing 1,540 households. Not surprisingly for a wealthy town, Management Occupations account for 30.4% of the workforce, the largest share, according to Data USA. The top industries by employment are Health Care & Social Assistance (23.4% of the workforce), Professional, Scientific, & Technical Services (17.3% of the workforce), and Utilities (8.06% of the workforce). The median household income in Nichols Hills is $203,750. The average household income is substantially higher, at $344,808. The median home value too blows other cities’ out of the water, at $855,300. And this town actually has higher property taxes than in the No. 1 richest city, the median paid being $9,281.
The third richest place in Oklahoma is Cedar Valley, a small town of just 199 households. What’s odd about this place is that it’s composed of two rectangular areas of residents, connected by a line that runs along State Highway 33. And it seems to be the more western rectangular block that contains most of the wealth, including many newer and larger homes. The median home value reported by the Census Bureau is $322,000, but this figure is bound to far higher in the western quadrant. The median household income is $128,828, while the average household income is $146,169. Nearly two-thirds of households here earn $100,000 or more; and $100,000 goes far in a state where the median household income is $63,603.
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