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Place dossier plate
SheetAL-MOUNTAIN-BROOK-AL · Mountain Brook, AL 22,160 pop · income 98th pct
Instrument codes from this place’s ACS population and household income, BEA state COL, FBI safety, national income percentile, photo-finish peer city, home-value band, and matched Census-tract book - not a moving recommendation.
Income neighbourhood around Mountain Brook
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Mountain Brook on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Anniston · lowest
44,806
Anniston · lowest
44,806 median HH income
23.4% of the leader · rank #1
Cochituate · near
190,938
Cochituate · near
190,938 median HH income
99.8% of the leader · rank #2
West Simsbury · near
191,042
West Simsbury · near
191,042 median HH income
99.8% of the leader · rank #3
Mountain Brook · this city
191,128
Mountain Brook · this city
191,128 median HH income
99.9% of the leader · rank #4
Powell · near
191,250
Powell · near
191,250 median HH income
99.9% of the leader · rank #5
Fairwood · near
191,319
Fairwood · near
191,319 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #6
Bethesda · highest
191,348
Bethesda · highest
191,348 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #7
What this shows Neighbourhood peers only - not a full nationwide city board. Open a near peer when the gap is small; open the poles when the spread is wide.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by population, income, and FBI crime rate
Out-of-state nearest neighbors for Mountain Brook on ACS population and median household income
, plus FBI UCR reporting rate when the extract covers this place. Link sets are deduped so each column is a distinct comparison path, not a forecast that peers share a labor market or climate.
Similar population
Nearest out-of-state cities by ACS population. This city: 22,160.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Mountain Brook - the verdict
Mountain Brook ranks in the 98th percentile for household income and the 70th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
98th
percentile, household income
96th
percentile, home value
1st
percentile, median rent
70th
percentile, safety
📝 How we sourced this
Population, income, and housing-cost figures come from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 5-year estimates (B-series tables). Crime data uses FBI UCR; climate uses NOAA Climate Normals; school counts come from NCES Common Core of Data; permits use the Census Building Permits Survey (BPS). See our methodology page for the full ETL pipeline and OMB / FIPS join keys.
Data Snapshot: Mountain Brook, AL
Alabama's Mountain Brook is a small city, with 22,160 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Median household income here is $191,128 per year, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 3.3%. Home values in Mountain Brook run a median of $891,300, and the median resident age is 41.5 years. About 88.4% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 59.8% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 11 residential units authorized here in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 68% from five years earlier. Mountain Brook reports a comparatively low crime rate: per-100,000 total crime stands at 837.8 in FBI UCR data, below the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Living costs in Alabama run below the national norm: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Alabama at 88.8 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Well Below Average). Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $936 monthly. Monthly utility costs average around $245 across Alabama, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 61.5 out of 100 (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Mountain Brook's data
How this reading path is ordered
This is not a composite city score. It is a city-specific route through the available public records, ordered for this profile so the page starts with questions the joined data can actually answer. The route here runs from reported crime to schools and households to comparison shortlist to work and mobility to population change to housing and income; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Mountain Brook, city-specific coverage includes local building permits, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, annual population history.
No matched row is reported here for within-city Census tract profiles; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
Question 1
What can the FBI record say about safety in Mountain Brook?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 837.8 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 63% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Treat this as a reporting-rate comparison, not a prediction of personal risk or a neighborhood-level safety grade. Tourism, daytime population, reporting practices, and variation inside the city are not adjusted away. The state rank and same-state peer table are the narrower comparisons available on this page.
What does the education layer cover for Mountain Brook?
The city has a broader matched school footprint, but count alone does not describe performance, capacity, program availability, or attendance boundaries. This profile deliberately avoids converting it into an unsupported family-friendliness score.
The NCES join finds 6 public schools within the city match. 88.4% of adults age 25+ hold a bachelor's degree or higher in the ACS estimate. These measures answer different questions: the school count describes local institutions, while adult attainment describes residents and cannot be used as a school-quality rating.
Which cities make useful reference points for Mountain Brook?
Use the in-state set to hold state policy and broad price conditions more nearly constant. Use the nationwide size set to ask whether cities with a similar resident count produce different housing, income, or commute outcomes. The income set is a third lens, deliberately separate from population matching. The nationwide peer panel below adds a fourth FBI UCR reporting-rate lens, not personal risk.
Within Alabama, the closest population matches are Oxford (22,063 residents, $70,065 income); Foley (22,330 residents, $67,346 income); Albertville (22,584 residents, $57,103 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Camp Springs, MD (22,174 residents); Bayou Cane, LA (22,143 residents); Sunny Isles Beach, FL (22,125 residents). A third, income-matched reference set of 6 out-of-state cities sits in the income neighbourhood chart near the Place Dossier plate. These are mechanical peer sets, not claims that the places share a labor market, climate, culture, or metro context.
What does the journey to work look like in Mountain Brook?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 80.2%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Mode share answers how workers usually travel; it does not measure congestion, reliability, distance to a particular job, or the quality of transit service. Remote work has a visible role in the local pattern. That can reduce commute exposure for some workers, but it says nothing about job availability or broadband quality; read it alongside income and housing rather than as a stand-alone lifestyle score.
These joined records add useful context, but they do not need another full-size panel. Each remains a separate measure with its own geography and source boundary.
Population change
Is Mountain Brook growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -847 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -3.8% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 11 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Recent estimates point downward. A falling count can reflect migration, household size, annexation boundaries, or estimation noise, so it is a prompt to inspect the full series rather than a claim about local economic health.
2020 estimate
22,508
2025 estimate
21,661
Period change
-3.8%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
How far does income reach against housing in Mountain Brook?
This is a citywide price-to-income reference, not a mortgage-affordability test; it does not include interest rates, taxes, insurance, household size, or an individual buyer's down payment. Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median. That flags a question for comparison, not a verdict: tenure, household composition, financing costs, and the age of the ACS estimate can all change what a resident actually pays.
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 4.7 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 3.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
4.7×
Home value
$891,300
Household income
$191,128
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Comparative score against U.S. cities with population of 1,000 or more on Census ACS medians
(income, poverty, bachelor's share, cost of living) and FBI UCR violent-crime rates when
published. Higher means a stronger standing on those published figures, not a livability
rating, not a recommendation to move, buy, or pick a "best" city. Missing inputs drop out
and redistribute weight.
How it is calculated.
Household income A+
$191,128
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share A+
88.4%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Cost of living A+
88.8 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Violent crime A-
65 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Poverty rate B+
3.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Mountain Brook profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Household income: 100/100 (A+) · $191,128
Bachelor's+ share: 100/100 (A+) · 88.4%
Cost of living: 90/100 (A+) · 88.8 index
Violent crime: 80/100 (A-) · 65 /100k
Poverty rate: 76/100 (B+) · 3.3%
Where Mountain Brook sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Mountain Brook's median home value and FBI crime rate plotted with similar-size and
same-state peers (padded with large cities when the peer set is thin). The second
read: pricey does not always mean safer, check which quadrant this city lands in.
Census ACS median home value vs FBI UCR crime rate - Mountain Brook highlighted among 10 peers.Read the chart values
Mountain Brook, AL (this city): home $891,300, crime 838/100k
Sunny Isles Beach, FL : home $489,700, crime 1,328/100k
La Porte, IN : home $143,800, crime 1,848/100k
Clarksville, IN : home $172,700, crime 3,527/100k
Oxford, AL : home $164,700, crime 2,804/100k
Foley, AL : home $260,100, crime 1,722/100k
Albertville, AL : home $158,900, crime 1,996/100k
Helena, AL : home $292,700, crime 507/100k
Anniston, AL : home $141,600, crime 5,211/100k
Fairhope, AL : home $406,500, crime 1,261/100k
How does Mountain Brook compare to other US cities?
Where Mountain Brook sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income98% higher than other cities
Home value96% pricier than other cities
Median rent1% pricier than other cities
Safety70% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
National percentiles can mask local variation. Looking only at Alabama, Mountain Brook ranks #42 of 222 Alabama cities by lowest crime rate - a narrower, more locally useful cut than the national comparison above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Mountain Brook against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Alabama only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Alabama-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Mountain Brook near the bottom of Alabama's cities
Among the 556 Alabama cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Mountain Brook ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Mountain Brook only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1 of 530
100th percentile in Alabama
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 556
0th percentile in Alabama
Median Home Value
#1 of 517
100th percentile in Alabama
Poverty Rate
#469 of 556
15th percentile in Alabama
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#1 of 556
100th percentile in Alabama
How in-state ranks are ordered
Ranked by raw value (highest first); a higher rank is not automatically "better" for every measure, see each metric's own context above. This is a comparison within Alabama only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
98th percentile nationally for median household income · 70th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Mountain Brook's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Mountain Brook's percentile rank on 3 favorable-direction measures (income, affordability, safety) vs. every tracked US city -- higher on every axis is more favorable. Not a composite quality score, just the arithmetic mean of the axes shown.
How Mountain Brook's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$891,3004th percentilemore affordable than 4% of 15,600 US cities
Show national distribution
Each bar is a $25K-wide band; taller bars hold more US cities. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-Year Estimates · 2023
Mountain Brook's home-value-to-income ratio: 4.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#12,309 of 15,516
More affordable than 21% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#2,447 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 4.7×, Mountain Brook sits in the moderate band:
national rank #12,309 of 15,516 and #2,447 of 3,317small cities (10,000–49,999).
Income and home value move in the same broad scale; check same-state peers before treating the multiple as an advantage or a warning.
How this ratio is calculated
Ratio = Census ACS 2023 median home value ÷ median household income for cities with both fields and population ≥ 1,000.
Rank 1 = lowest ratio (most compact). Bands match the fleet affordability thresholds used on guides (<3.0 / 3.0–5.0 / >5.0).
This is not a mortgage payment estimate and does not include rates, taxes, insurance, or down payment.
Income distribution context
$191,128Mountain Brook, AL median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Mountain Brook, AL median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Mountain Brook, AL.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)88.4%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)3.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)59.8%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
22,160
Median Income
$191,128
Median Home Value
$891,300
Median Age
41.5
Poverty Rate
3.3%
Labor force participation
59.8%
Bachelor's Degree+
88.4%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
837.8
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
65.2
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
772.6
per 100,000 residents
Crime reporting caveat
Reflects incidents reported to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program — agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies by jurisdiction and year, so this reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score. Not adjusted for tourism, commuter, or daytime population.
Schools
Total Schools
6
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Mountain Brook's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
22,508 residents
2021
22,256 residents
2022
21,989 residents
2023
21,818 residents
2024
21,805 residents
2025
21,661 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
11
housing units authorized
Single-Family
11
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.5
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
34
34
0
$25.9M
2020
37
37
0
$31.9M
2021
31
31
0
$37.5M
2022
26
26
0
$26.4M
2023
24
24
0
$33.5M
2024
11
11
0
$14.7M
Permit volume decreased 68% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
80.2%
Carpool
2.8%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
0.2%
Work from Home
16.5%
Based on 9,740 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Alabama statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $245
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Alabama at $245 (electricity about $138 , water and sewer about $45 ).
These are Alabama statewide averages, not a meter reading for Mountain Brook. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Alabama's BEA cost-of-living index is 88.8 (Well Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Mountain Brook is $936/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Alabama statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 61.5 / 100 (Moderate).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Alabama statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Mountain Brook sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Mountain Brook compares to similar-size Alabama cities
Same-state peer method
Closest same-state population matches, not geographic neighbors. Population + median household income come from Census Bureau ACS 5-year B01001 and B19013.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-Year 2023, FBI UCR, NCES CCD, Census BPS 2024, Census ACS B08301/B08136, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023, BEA Regional Price Parities 2024, HUD Fair Market Rents 2026, FEMA National Risk Index.