Picacho HillsNM
A town of 2,002.
Is Picacho Hills a good place to live?
Picacho Hills’ best subject grade is an A− for incomes; its weakest is a C for cost of living. 67% of adults 25 and older hold a bachelor’s degree or more in Picacho Hills, above both New Mexico’s towns (23%) and U.S. towns (29%). On incomes, just 4 of New Mexico’s 156 towns do better. Picacho Hills’ trail density is 3.0 miles per square mile, where New Mexico’s towns sit at 1.0 and U.S. towns at 0.4. The biggest park or preserve is Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument, at 33 acres. Picacho Hills has fewer than 2,500 residents, so it gets subject grades but no overall grade.
What makes Picacho Hills stand out
Where Picacho Hills beats most towns.
| Widest gap | Picacho Hills | NM |
|---|---|---|
| Fewer adults facing housing insecurity | 6.4% | 16.5% |
98% of working residents leave Picacho Hills for work
Where Picacho Hills’s working residents go each day. Line width shows the share.
Census LEHD 2023
How Picacho Hills grades
Each subject compared with towns across the country (schools within New Mexico), ordered by how far Picacho Hills is from typical.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Moving to Picacho Hills: who provides what
Picacho Hills is unincorporated, so Doña Ana County and regional agencies provide most services.
EPA SDWIS (Oct 9, 2026) · HIFLD + EIA-861 2025 · Census 2020 ZCTAs · NCES 2024–25 · registration: vote.gov, updated Aug 27, 2026.
The data
Ordered by what stands out in Picacho Hills.
About half of Picacho Hills’ working residents commute to Las Cruces
Most working residents leave Picacho Hills for work: only 2% work in town. The median household income in Picacho Hills is $121,000. Only 5 of the 74 New Mexico towns we compare have a lower share of residents below the poverty line than Picacho Hills.
| Picacho Hills | New Mexico towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median household income | $121,000 | $55,000 | $80,000 |
| Below the poverty line | 5.6% | 21% | 9.6% |
| Average trip to work | 30 minutes | 23 minutes | 25 minutes |
| Working residents who work in town | 1.9% | 14% | 8% |
Where working residents work
Census LEHD 2023 · ACS
Picacho Hills faces a low natural-hazard risk, led by inland flooding
Expected storm and flood damage is lower than in 77% of U.S. communities.
FEMA National Risk Index · OpenFEMA
Picacho Hills stands out in New Mexico and nationally, with fewer of its adults who report frequent mental distress
11% of adults report frequent mental distress in Picacho Hills. Only 3 of the 74 New Mexico towns we compare have a lower share of adults who feel lonely than Picacho Hills. 19% of adults say their health is fair or poor in Picacho Hills.
| Picacho Hills | New Mexico towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Frequent mental distress (CDC PLACES) | 11% | 16% | 17% |
| Sleep under 7 hours (CDC PLACES) | 25% | 34% | 36% |
| Yearly checkup (CDC PLACES) | 81% | 69% | 79% |
| Feel lonely (CDC PLACES) | 28% | 35% | 33% |
| What stands out | Picacho Hills | NM |
|---|---|---|
| Fewer adults facing housing insecurity | 6.4% | 16.5% |
| Fewer adults facing a utility shut-off | 4.4% | 11.2% |
| More adults who have had cancer | 14.5% | 7.4% |
CDC PLACES 2025 · modeled estimates for adults · CMS · HRSA
Picacho Hills has mild winters and hot summers
Picacho Hills has mild winters and hot summers, with very little rain. Picacho Hills’ July high is 95°F.
Typical low → high °F
NOAA U.S. Climate Normals, 1991–2020
| Biggest places to walk | Trails | Acres |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument | 0.1 mi | 33 |
Trails & parks © OpenStreetMap contributors · Conserved land: USGS PAD-US
Compared with most of New Mexico and the rest of the country, more of Picacho Hills’ households own their home
100% of Picacho Hills households own their home. The median sale price was $470,000 in May 2026.
Census ACS, 2020–24 · Zillow Home Value Index · Redfin Data Center
Everything we know about Picacho Hills
Colleges nearby
3 within 15 miles of the center of Picacho Hills
About 4 of every 100 Picacho Hills residents are enrolled in college, against 6 across New Mexico.
About Picacho Hills
Census-designated place in New Mexico, United States
Picacho Hills is a planned community and census-designated place (CDP) in Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States. It was first listed as a CDP prior to the 2020 census. As of the 2020 census, Picacho Hills had a population of 1,864. The community is in central Doña Ana County, 6 miles (10 km) west of the center of Las Cruces and on the west side of the Rio Grande valley, on a hillside rising above the older community of Picacho. The CDP takes its name from Picacho Hills Country Club, around which the residential areas of the community have been built. It is located in Las Cruces Public Schools.
From Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 · facts via Wikidata (CC0)
- Area
- 3.2 sq mi
- Elevation
- 4,137 ft
Picacho Hills’s neighbors
One town shares a border with Picacho Hills.
| Town | NM rank | Overall | Cost | Safety | Schools | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Picacho Hills | — | — | C | — | B− | B+ |
| Las Cruces | #56 | D | C | D− | B− | B− |
Picacho Hills has fewer than 2,500 residents, so it gets subject grades but no overall grade. Picacho Hills reports no FBI crime data of its own. Compare Picacho Hills with a neighbor →
Questions about Picacho Hills
Short answers, built from the data on this page.
Is Picacho Hills, NM expensive?
That is 8 years of the area's median household income ($56,848 across the Las Cruces, NM metro area). Cost of living, which also weighs rents, property taxes and how many households pay 30% or more of their income for housing, grades C.