Sand Lake vs Tawas City

A side-by-side comparison of Sand Lake and Tawas City: population, income, housing, and more.

Sand Lake and Tawas City are places in Michigan. This page compares them across population, income, housing, education, commuting, and how each has changed since 2019.

Tawas City has the higher population (1,654 vs 1,214 in Sand Lake). Sand Lake has the higher median household income ($49,615 vs $46,797 in Tawas City). Sand Lake has the higher median home value ($139,300 vs $124,000 in Tawas City).

Population, income & housing

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
Population	1,214	1,654
Median age	61.9 yrs	48.0 yrs
Median household income	$49,615	$46,797
Median home value	$139,300	$124,000
Median gross rent	$633	$810
Housing units	1,664	931
Homeownership rate	91.3%	77.7%
Bachelor's degree or higher	15.9%	19.7%
Unemployment rate	3.2%	10.8%

Trends (ACS 5-year, 2019–2023)

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
Population	1,407 → 1,214 (-13.7%)	1,881 → 1,654 (-12.1%)
Median household income	$36,684 → $49,615 (+35.2%)	$49,226 → $46,797 (-4.9%)
Median home value	$94,700 → $139,300 (+47.1%)	$96,300 → $124,000 (+28.8%)
Median gross rent	$612 → $633 (+3.4%)	$707 → $810 (+14.6%)

Sand Lake

Population

1,4071,214

Median household income

$36,684$49,615

Median home value

$94,700$139,300

Median gross rent

$612$633

Tawas City

Population

1,8811,654

Median household income

$49,226$46,797

Median home value

$96,300$124,000

Median gross rent

$707$810

Age & race/ethnicity

Age distribution (share)

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
Under 5	2.2%	3.3%
5 to 17	7.0%	15.2%
18 to 24	2.8%	4.6%
25 to 34	8.0%	10.0%
35 to 44	4.5%	13.1%
45 to 54	8.0%	9.7%
55 to 64	28.3%	17.7%
65 to 74	22.3%	15.4%
75 and over	16.8%	11.1%

Race & ethnicity (share)

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
White (non-Hispanic)	97.0%	88.0%
Black or African American	0.0%	1.6%
American Indian & Alaska Native	0.1%	0.0%
Asian	0.2%	2.9%
Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander	0.0%	0.0%
Some other race	0.4%	0.3%
Two or more races	2.3%	5.4%
Hispanic or Latino	0.0%	1.8%

Educational attainment (age 25+)

Share of adults 25+

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
No high school diploma	11.3%	10.1%
High school graduate	32.4%	42.6%
Some college or associate's	40.4%	27.6%
Bachelor's degree	9.3%	12.2%
Graduate or professional degree	6.6%	7.5%

Commute to work

How workers get to work (share)

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
Drove alone	77.9%	82.6%
Carpooled	5.3%	6.5%
Public transit	0.0%	0.0%
Walked	3.1%	2.5%
Bicycle	0.0%	1.5%
Worked from home	11.2%	6.5%
Other means	2.5%	0.5%

Housing

Units in structure (share)

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
1-unit, detached	91.2%	77.4%
1-unit, attached	0.4%	2.1%
2 to 4 units	1.0%	1.9%
5 to 19 units	0.0%	11.1%
20 or more units	0.2%	2.5%
Mobile home & other	7.2%	4.9%

Poverty & households

	Sand Lake	Tawas City
Poverty rate	17.5%	11.2%
Average household size	1.95	2.24
Mean commute (minutes)	37	17
Median year structure built	1970	1968