Community Profile: Rancho Mirage

The Neighborhood Data for Social Change (NDSC) platform is a project of the USC Price Center for Social Innovation. Lift To Rise is partnering with The Price Center in the development of the Neighborhood Data for Social Change (NDSC) platform for the Coachella Valley. Lift to Rise is a community-based partnership in the Coachella Valley with the primary goal of advancing a future where all Coachella Valley families are healthy, stable, and thriving. NDSC will publish an ongoing series of data stories that incorporate maps, data visualizations, photos, and rich narrative to highlight trends, opportunities, and challenges facing communities in the region.

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Community profiles provide insight and information to the nine cities and unincorporated places in the Coachella Valley. The profiles provide precise, relevant data at the community level in combination with interactive maps and visualizations to help community members learn about the most important issues facing their communities and to help policy makers make informed decisions for their constituents. Community profiles are updated annually with the latest data, with new profiles released on a regular basis.

Rancho Mirage is a city located in the center of the Coachella Valley in Riverside County. It sits between Cathedral City and Palm Desert and is 24.77 square miles large. The City is a popular vacation destination with many luxury resorts, golf courses, and tennis courts. Rancho Mirage became popular among celebrities in the 1950s after the Thunderbird Country Club opened there in 1951. Frank Sinatra and the rest of the Rat Pack, Bob Hope, the Marx brothers, and Lucille Ball all owned vacation homes in Rancho Mirage. In the last several years the city's Sunnylands property has held two U.S. Presidential meetings and has become known as the "Camp David of the West."

Today Rancho Mirage is home to 17,975 residents with a median income of $64,754, which is relatively high for the Coachella Valley. Compared to the rest of the Coachella Valley, Rancho Mirage has relatively fewer immigrants (14% of total population), higher college graduation rates (47%), and higher rates of homeownership (78%). Only 1% of Rancho Mirage's population live in non-English speaking households, which is much lower than the rest of the Coachella Valley.

Explore the visualizations below to learn more about demography, housing, education, environment, health and social connectedness in Rancho Mirage and how the community compares to the state, county and other places in the Coachella Valley. 

Demography

Rancho Mirage has a population of 17,975, making it the smallest city in Coachella Valley. The average household size is 1.9 people, lower than the average household size in Coachella Valley of 2.62.

Rancho Mirage has a high rate of non-family households (individuals living alone or with non-relatives). 47% are non-family households in Rancho Mirage as compared with 39% in the Coachella Valley, 31% in California, and 34% in the US.

Race & Ethnicity

10% of the population in Rancho Mirage identifies as Hispanic, which is far lower than the Coachella Valley average of 52%. The only two cities in the Valley with a lower Hispanic population are Desert Palms and Indian Wells which each have between 3-4%.

Rancho Mirage also has the third largest percentage of residents identifying as White in the Coachella Valley at 82%.

Immigration

Just 14% of Rancho Mirage’s population are immigrants. That is below average for the Coachella Valley and California, however it is slightly higher than the US population of immigrants.

Nearly 48% of those immigrants are citizens which is above average for the Coachella Valley (37%) and equal to the national average.

Select a community to the right of the chart to see how immigrant population compares to Rancho Mirage.  

Age Distribution

The population in Rancho Mirage has a median age of 67 years old, well above the median ages of California (36), and the United States (38).

52% of the population is 65 years and older, while this same age group comprises only 22% of the Coachella Valley.

Linguistic Isolation

The percent of non-English speaking households (also called "linguistically isolated"), where no one over the age of 14 reported speaking English "well" or "very well", in Rancho Mirage is lower than in the rest of the Coachella Valley. The percent of non-English speaking households in Rancho Mirage is just over 1% while the average in Coachella Valley is 13%, compared to 9% in California and 4% in the United States.

Education

College Graduation

Rancho Mirage has a college graduation rate that is nearly 20 percentage points higher than the average in the Coachella Valley. Rancho Mirage has a 43% college graduation rate while the Coachella Valley’s average college graduation rate is 24%.

Less than High School Diploma

The rate of residents without high school diplomas in Rancho Mirage is low in comparison to the rest of the Coachella Valley. In Rancho Mirage, 4% of people over 25 are without a high school diploma compared with 20% in the Coachella Valley, 17% in California, and 13% nationally.

Select a community to the right of the chart to see how less than high school diploma rates compare to Rancho Mirage.

Income & Poverty

Median Household Income

The median household income in Rancho Mirage is $64,754, greater than the median income in the greater Coachella Valley, $55,403. However, the median income has fallen by about $7,000 since 2009, while the median household income in the Coachella Valley, California, and the US has been rising.

Select a community to the right of the chart to see how median household income compares to Rancho Mirage.

Poverty Rates

While median household income in Rancho Mirage has been declining, rates of poverty among black residents has fallen drastically in the same time frame. While the number of black residents has remained mostly consistent at 2% of the population, the percent living below the poverty line has fallen from 52% in 2012 to 15% in 2017.

Housing & Real Estate

Median Rent Price

Rancho Mirage has the third highest median gross rent in the Coachella Valley at $1251. This rent is the equal to the median gross rent for Riverside County and less than the state’s median. Desert Palms has the highest rent at $1,939 and La Quinta is the second highest with a median rent of $1,386.

Select a community to the right of the chart to see how median rent prices compare to Rancho Mirage.

Rent Burden

High rents can lead to rent burden, and 56% of the population in Rancho Mirage were rent burdened in 2017. This average is slightly higher than rent-burdened population in California (53%) but equal to the County of Riverside’s rent-burdened population.

Homeownership

The rate of homeownership in Rancho Mirage is high when compared with rates of homeownership across the Coachella Valley. As of 2017, the homeownership rate was 78% compared to a 65% homeownership rate in the Coachella Valley.

Source Notes: All data in this community profile come from either the 2017 5-year estimates of the American Community Survey. 

Cover Photo Credit: Noe Montes