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Place dossier plate
SheetAR-MOUNTAIN-HOME-AR · Mountain Home, AR 13,021 pop · income 10th pct · 10 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 Mountain Home
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Mountain Home on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Forrest City · lowest
33,522
Forrest City · lowest
33,522 median HH income
41.6% of the leader · rank #1
Farina · near
42,098
Farina · near
42,098 median HH income
52.2% of the leader · rank #2
Grace · near
42,098
Grace · near
42,098 median HH income
52.2% of the leader · rank #3
Mountain Home · this city
42,103
Mountain Home · this city
42,103 median HH income
52.2% of the leader · rank #4
Stateline · near
42,103
Stateline · near
42,103 median HH income
52.2% of the leader · rank #5
Wedderburn · near
42,104
Wedderburn · near
42,104 median HH income
52.2% of the leader · rank #6
Marion · highest
80,637
Marion · highest
80,637 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 Home 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: 13,021.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Mountain Home - the verdict
Mountain Home ranks in the 10th percentile for household income and the 22nd percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
10th
percentile, household income
30th
percentile, home value
3rd
percentile, median rent
22nd
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 Home, AR
Arkansas's Mountain Home is a small town, with 13,021 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Mountain Home households earn a median of $42,103 annually, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 12.3%. Home values in Mountain Home run a median of $160,200, and the median resident age is 43.0 years. Educational attainment runs 20.0% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 44.7% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 31 residential building permits were authorized in Mountain Home (Building Boom), up 94% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Crime here tracks close to the national norm: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 2532.2 total incidents per 100,000 residents here, near the national average (agency reporting is voluntary, so this measures reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Living costs in Arkansas run below the national norm: the state registers 86.9 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Well Below Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $944 monthly. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Arkansas run around $210, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 55.5 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Mountain Home'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 comparison shortlist to population change to housing and income to within-city variation to reported crime to schools and households to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Mountain Home, city-specific coverage includes within-city Census tract profiles, FBI reported-crime rates, annual population history, commute-mode shares, matched public-school count, local building permits.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
1. Comparison shortlist
Which cities make useful reference points for Mountain Home?
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 Arkansas, the closest population matches are Blytheville (13,026 residents, $49,928 income); Forrest City (12,826 residents, $33,522 income); Harrison (13,217 residents, $40,568 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Sharon, PA (13,019 residents); Athens, TX (13,013 residents); Smyrna, DE (13,031 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.
Is Mountain Home growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +535 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +4.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 31 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 upward. Growth can increase housing demand and service needs, but the permit record must move in the same direction before calling it a supply response; the two series measure different things.
How far does income reach against housing in Mountain Home?
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.
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.8 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 12.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
What can 10 Census tracts reveal inside Mountain Home?
PlainCities matches 10 Census tracts to this 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.
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.
Reported crime
What can the FBI record say about safety in Mountain Home?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 2532.2 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 11% higher 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.
Total reported rate
2532.2
Violent rate
275.6
Property rate
2256.6
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
What does the education layer cover for Mountain Home?
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. 20.0% 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.
Poverty estimate
12.3%
Bachelor's degree+
20.0%
Matched public schools
6
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Mountain Home?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 75.4%. 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. 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.
Drive alone
75.4%
Work from home
5.6%
Public transit
0.0%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 4,764 workers age 16+.
Lowest-decile income · poverty 12.3% (Above-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
86.9 (US=100)
Very affordable · BEA RPP 2024, Arkansas average
D
City profile score · Mountain Home, AR
41/100
5 published dimensions · ACS/FBI 2023
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+
86.9 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 F
276 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share F
20.0%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate F
12.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income F
$42,103
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Mountain Home profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 97/100 (A+) · 86.9 index
Violent crime: 37/100 (F) · 276 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 34/100 (F) · 20.0%
Poverty rate: 31/100 (F) · 12.3%
Household income: 10/100 (F) · $42,103
Where Mountain Home sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Mountain Home'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 Home highlighted among 12 peers.Read the chart values
Mountain Home, AR (this city): home $160,200, crime 2,532/100k
Sharon, PA : home $79,100, crime 2,117/100k
Athens, TX : home $205,700, crime 1,830/100k
Smyrna, DE : home $273,400, crime 2,450/100k
Tomball, TX : home $306,400, crime 2,237/100k
West Carrollton, OH : home $137,700, crime 2,000/100k
Blytheville, AR : home $101,200, crime 5,780/100k
Forrest City, AR : home $87,800, crime 4,030/100k
Harrison, AR : home $165,000, crime 2,107/100k
Marion, AR : home $206,300, crime 2,871/100k
Batesville, AR : home $159,200, crime 1,901/100k
Magnolia, AR : home $166,500, crime 3,042/100k
How does Mountain Home compare to other US cities?
Here's how Mountain Home stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income10% higher than other cities
Home value30% pricier than other cities
Median rent3% pricier than other cities
Safety22% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
A national percentile can hide a lot of local variation: narrowed to Arkansas alone, Mountain Home ranks #113 of 160 Arkansas cities by lowest crime rate - a different, more locally useful comparison than stacking it against the entire country.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Mountain Home against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Arkansas only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Arkansas-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Mountain Home near the bottom of Arkansas's cities
Among the 524 Arkansas cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Mountain Home ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Mountain Home only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#319 of 495
36th percentile in Arkansas
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 524
0th percentile in Arkansas
Median Home Value
#112 of 482
77th percentile in Arkansas
Poverty Rate
#283 of 524
45th percentile in Arkansas
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#130 of 524
75th percentile in Arkansas
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 Arkansas only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
10th percentile nationally for median household income · 22nd percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Mountain Home's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Mountain Home'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 Home's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$160,200Among 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
Mountain Home's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.8×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#10,076 of 15,516
More affordable than 35% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#1,795 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.8×, Mountain Home sits in the moderate band:
national rank #10,076 of 15,516 and #1,795 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
$42,103Mountain Home, AR median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Mountain Home, AR 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 Home, AR.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)20.0%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)12.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)44.7%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
13,021
Median Income
$42,103
Median Home Value
$160,200
Median Age
43.0
Poverty Rate
12.3%
Labor force participation
44.7%
Bachelor's Degree+
20.0%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2532.2
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
275.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2256.6
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 Home's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
12,838 residents
2021
13,007 residents
2022
13,121 residents
2023
13,239 residents
2024
13,321 residents
2025
13,373 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📈 Building Boom
Total Permits (2024)
31
housing units authorized
Single-Family
21
detached homes
Multifamily
10
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
2.4
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
16
3
13
$2.2M
2020
56
14
42
$6.6M
2021
80
50
30
$15.5M
2022
24
14
10
$4.8M
2023
45
31
14
$11.3M
2024
31
21
10
$5.9M
Permit volume increased 94% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
75.4%
Carpool
15.2%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
1.3%
Work from Home
5.6%
Other
2.5%
Based on 4,764 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Arkansas statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $210
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Arkansas at $210 (electricity about $110 , water and sewer about $42 ).
These are Arkansas statewide averages, not a meter reading for Mountain Home. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Arkansas's BEA cost-of-living index is 86.9 (Well Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Mountain Home is $944/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Arkansas statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 55.5 / 100 (Moderate).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Arkansas statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Mountain Home sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Mountain Home compares to similar-size Arkansas 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.