Forest Lake vs Tower Lakes

A side-by-side comparison of Forest Lake and Tower Lakes: population, income, housing, and more.

Forest Lake and Tower Lakes are places in Illinois. This page compares them across population, income, housing, education, commuting, and how each has changed since 2019.

Forest Lake has the higher population (1,797 vs 1,148 in Tower Lakes). Tower Lakes has the higher median household income ($172,656 vs $92,956 in Forest Lake). Tower Lakes has the higher median home value ($495,900 vs $318,300 in Forest Lake).

Population, income & housing

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
Population	1,797	1,148
Median age	40.8 yrs	48.8 yrs
Median household income	$92,956	$172,656
Median home value	$318,300	$495,900
Median gross rent	—	$2,375
Housing units	737	459
Homeownership rate	94.5%	97.2%
Bachelor's degree or higher	52.4%	77.8%
Unemployment rate	5.3%	3.3%

Trends (ACS 5-year, 2019–2023)

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
Population	1,327 → 1,797 (+35.4%)	1,290 → 1,148 (-11.0%)
Median household income	$125,096 → $92,956 (-25.7%)	$147,000 → $172,656 (+17.5%)
Median home value	$321,200 → $318,300 (-0.9%)	$481,000 → $495,900 (+3.1%)
Median gross rent	—	$2,156 → $2,375 (+10.2%)

Forest Lake

Population

1,3271,797

Median household income

$125,096$92,956

Median home value

$321,200$318,300

Tower Lakes

Population

1,2901,148

Median household income

$147,000$172,656

Median home value

$481,000$495,900

Median gross rent

$2,156$2,375

Age & race/ethnicity

Age distribution (share)

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
Under 5	0.0%	3.7%
5 to 17	25.8%	19.7%
18 to 24	10.7%	6.0%
25 to 34	2.4%	6.8%
35 to 44	23.7%	9.1%
45 to 54	6.3%	14.5%
55 to 64	26.7%	16.9%
65 to 74	1.4%	15.7%
75 and over	2.8%	7.6%

Race & ethnicity (share)

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
White (non-Hispanic)	70.9%	88.2%
Black or African American	0.0%	1.0%
American Indian & Alaska Native	0.0%	0.0%
Asian	5.5%	2.4%
Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander	0.0%	0.0%
Some other race	0.0%	0.0%
Two or more races	0.0%	4.6%
Hispanic or Latino	23.7%	3.8%

Educational attainment (age 25+)

Share of adults 25+

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
No high school diploma	25.7%	0.0%
High school graduate	16.2%	5.8%
Some college or associate's	5.7%	16.4%
Bachelor's degree	37.5%	44.9%
Graduate or professional degree	14.8%	32.8%

Commute to work

How workers get to work (share)

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
Drove alone	90.4%	72.5%
Carpooled	0.0%	1.6%
Public transit	0.0%	3.5%
Walked	0.0%	0.0%
Bicycle	0.0%	0.0%
Worked from home	4.8%	20.2%
Other means	4.8%	2.2%

Housing

Units in structure (share)

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
1-unit, detached	100.0%	100.0%
1-unit, attached	0.0%	0.0%
2 to 4 units	0.0%	0.0%
5 to 19 units	0.0%	0.0%
20 or more units	0.0%	0.0%
Mobile home & other	0.0%	0.0%

Poverty & households

	Forest Lake	Tower Lakes
Poverty rate	5.3%	3.0%
Average household size	2.73	2.64
Mean commute (minutes)	30	38
Median year structure built	1994	1964