The city of Chicago may be chock full of trendy neighborhoods, soaring high-rise penthouses, and historical mansions built by 19th century patricians, but it does not contain a single ZIP code among the metro area's 50 wealthiest.
All of Chicagoland's richest communities lie beyond the city limits in a ring of suburban towns — starting in the historically tony North Shore, extending west to the Kane County line, circling down through DuPage County, and terminating in the far southwest reaches of Cook County.
To visualize the geographic distribution of the Chicago area's wealthiest ZIP codes, the Chicago Business Journal enlisted the help of Esri, a California-based data mapping company. Esri’s updated demographics data were used to compile a ranked list of the top 50 richest ZIPs within Cook, DuPage, and Lake counties.
The ZIP code data was then applied to the interactive map found below. Click on the ZIP codes shaded in blue to discover the Chicago area's 50 most affluent towns and the household wealth data for each.
For every ranked ZIP code, Esri has also included a link to its Tapestry Segmentation feature, which assigns neighborhoods to 67 unique categories based on demographic, socioeconomic, and consumer spending characteristics. Nine of the 10 wealthiest ZIPs in the Chicago area, for example, are in the "Top Tier" segment, which is characterized by high levels of disposable income and a net worth about eight times the national median.
According to Esri, the Top 10 wealthiest ZIP codes in the Chicago area are:
- 60043 - Kenilworth
- 60022 - Glencoe
- 60093 - Winnetka
- 60521 - Hinsdale
- 60045 - Lake Forest
- 60091 - Wilmette
- 60558 - Western Springs
- 60523 - Oak Brook
- 60184 - Wayne
- 60015 - Deerfield