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Place dossier plate
SheetAL-PHENIX-CITY-AL · Phenix City, AL 38,477 pop · income 19th pct · 18 tracts
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 Phenix City
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Phenix City on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Atlantic City · lowest
36,220
Atlantic City · lowest
36,220 median HH income
28.0% of the leader · rank #1
Clemson · near
49,713
Clemson · near
49,713 median HH income
38.5% of the leader · rank #2
Center Point · near
49,714
Center Point · near
49,714 median HH income
38.5% of the leader · rank #3
Phenix City · this city
49,715
Phenix City · this city
49,715 median HH income
38.5% of the leader · rank #4
Barron · near
49,715
Barron · near
49,715 median HH income
38.5% of the leader · rank #5
El Cerro Miss… · near
49,719
El Cerro Miss… · near
49,719 median HH income
38.5% of the leader · rank #6
Vestavia Hills · highest
129,171
Vestavia Hills · highest
129,171 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 Phenix City 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: 38,477.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Phenix City - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Phenix City places in the 19th percentile for household income and the 6th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
19th
percentile, household income
30th
percentile, home value
1st
percentile, median rent
6th
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: Phenix City, AL
Alabama's Phenix City is a small city, with 38,477 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Phenix City households earn a median of $49,715 annually, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 19.8%. Home values in Phenix City run a median of $160,000, and the median resident age is 35.8 years. 23.3% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 55.0% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 75 residential units authorized here in 2024 (Rapid Growth), up 29% from five years earlier. Phenix City's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 4248.1 total incidents per 100,000 residents here, above the national average (agency reporting is voluntary, so this measures 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). A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $936 per month statewide. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Alabama run around $245, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Commute times here average 19.0 minutes, with 78.1% driving alone and 9.6% working from home, per Census ACS commuting data. 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 Phenix City'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 population change to within-city variation to housing and income to schools and households to comparison shortlist to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Phenix City, city-specific coverage includes within-city Census tract profiles, FBI reported-crime rates, commute-mode shares, local building permits, matched public-school count, annual population history.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
1. Reported crime
What can the FBI record say about safety in Phenix City?
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.
The joined FBI UCR record reports 4248.1 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 86% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Is Phenix City growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
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.
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -477 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -1.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 75 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
What can 18 Census tracts reveal inside Phenix City?
That layer breaks the citywide income, rent, and home-value medians into smaller Census geographies, which can reveal differences that one municipal median necessarily hides. A tract is a statistical area, not a locally defined neighborhood or a promise about conditions on a particular block. Start with the city profile for the broad comparison, then use the tract layer to test whether the same housing and income pattern is consistent across the city. Large within-city spreads are a reason to avoid treating any citywide median as a universal resident experience.
PlainCities matches 18 Census tracts to this city.
Which cities make useful reference points for Phenix City?
Within Alabama, the closest population matches are Vestavia Hills (38,704 residents, $129,171 income); Prattville (38,850 residents, $79,396 income); Florence (41,231 residents, $50,396 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Calexico, CA (38,476 residents); Atlantic City, NJ (38,486 residents); Wheeling, IL (38,495 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.
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.
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.
Housing and income
How far does income reach against housing in Phenix City?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.2 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 19.8%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
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. Income and home value move within the same broad scale here. The useful next check is not a generic affordability label, but whether similar-size cities offer a materially different income, housing, or commute trade-off.
Household income
$49,715
Home value
$160,000
Value / income
3.2×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What does the education layer cover for Phenix City?
The NCES join finds 12 public schools within the city match. 23.3% 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.
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.
Matched public schools
12
Bachelor's degree+
23.3%
Poverty estimate
19.8%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Phenix City?
Mode share answers how workers usually travel; it does not measure congestion, reliability, distance to a particular job, or the quality of transit service. No single mode completely explains the work trip here. The mix is more useful than a one-number commute grade, especially when comparing places where transit, walking, and remote work divide the non-driving share differently.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 78.1%. The reported mean trip to work is 19.0 minutes.
Public transit
0.7%
Work from home
9.6%
Drive alone
78.1%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 17,333 workers age 16+.
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.
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.
Bachelor's+ share D
23.3%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income F
$49,715
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
19.8%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime F
778 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Phenix City profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 90/100 (A+) · 88.8 index
Bachelor's+ share: 44/100 (D) · 23.3%
Household income: 20/100 (F) · $49,715
Poverty rate: 14/100 (F) · 19.8%
Violent crime: 2/100 (F) · 778 /100k
Where Phenix City sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Phenix City'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 - Phenix City highlighted among 11 peers.Read the chart values
Phenix City, AL (this city): home $160,000, crime 4,248/100k
Calexico, CA : home $281,700, crime 682/100k
Atlantic City, NJ : home $189,600, crime 8,017/100k
Wheeling, IL : home $244,600, crime 969/100k
Urbana, IL : home $186,300, crime 3,036/100k
Vestavia Hills, AL : home $494,500, crime 728/100k
Prattville, AL : home $208,500, crime 2,117/100k
Florence, AL : home $174,100, crime 2,647/100k
Alabaster, AL : home $242,600, crime 1,610/100k
Gadsden, AL : home $101,900, crime 3,159/100k
Opelika, AL : home $213,700, crime 3,185/100k
How does Phenix City compare to other US cities?
Phenix City measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income19% higher than other cities
Home value30% pricier than other cities
Median rent1% pricier than other cities
Safety6% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Alabama and the picture shifts: Phenix City ranks #206 of 222 Alabama cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Phenix City 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 Phenix City near the bottom of Alabama's cities
Among the 556 Alabama cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Phenix City ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Phenix City only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#293 of 530
45th percentile in Alabama
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 556
0th percentile in Alabama
Median Home Value
#206 of 517
60th percentile in Alabama
Poverty Rate
#126 of 556
77th percentile in Alabama
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#144 of 556
74th 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
19th percentile nationally for median household income · 6th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Phenix City's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Phenix City'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 Phenix City's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$160,000Among the most affordablemore affordable than 70% 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
Phenix City's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.2×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#7,778 of 15,516
More affordable than 50% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#1,200 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.2×, Phenix City sits in the moderate band:
national rank #7,778 of 15,516 and #1,200 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
$49,715Phenix City, AL median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Phenix City, 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 Phenix City, AL.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)23.3%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)19.8%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)55.0%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
38,477
Median Income
$49,715
Median Home Value
$160,000
Median Age
35.8
Poverty Rate
19.8%
Labor force participation
55.0%
Bachelor's Degree+
23.3%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
4248.1
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
777.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
3470.5
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
12
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Phenix City's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
38,821 residents
2021
38,411 residents
2022
38,273 residents
2023
38,496 residents
2024
38,573 residents
2025
38,344 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📈 Rapid Growth
Total Permits (2024)
75
housing units authorized
Single-Family
71
detached homes
Multifamily
4
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
1.9
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
58
56
2
$8.7M
2020
139
55
84
$18.9M
2021
118
104
14
$11.6M
2022
262
94
168
$32.9M
2023
106
98
8
$14.8M
2024
75
71
4
$11.3M
Permit volume increased 29% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
19.0 minutes
Drive Alone
78.1%
Carpool
8.2%
Public Transit
0.7%
Walk
1.1%
Work from Home
9.6%
Other
2.3%
Based on 17,333 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 Phenix City. 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 Phenix City 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 Phenix City sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Phenix City 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.