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Place dossier plate
SheetCA-PION-HILLS-CA · Piñon Hills, CA 7,149 pop · income 43rd 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 Piñon Hills
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Piñon Hills on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Rayne · lowest
41,603
Rayne · lowest
41,603 median HH income
17.9% of the leader · rank #1
Partridge · near
65,156
Partridge · near
65,156 median HH income
28.1% of the leader · rank #2
Davenport · near
65,157
Davenport · near
65,157 median HH income
28.1% of the leader · rank #3
Piñon Hills · this city
65,160
Piñon Hills · this city
65,160 median HH income
28.1% of the leader · rank #4
Baroda · near
65,160
Baroda · near
65,160 median HH income
28.1% of the leader · rank #5
Sky Lake · near
65,161
Sky Lake · near
65,161 median HH income
28.1% of the leader · rank #6
Kentfield · highest
231,875
Kentfield · highest
231,875 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
Out-of-state nearest neighbors for Piñon Hills on ACS population and median household income
. 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: 7,149.
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Piñon Hills lands in the 43rd percentile for household income. Source: Census ACS.
43rd
percentile, household income
77th
percentile, home value
88th
percentile, median rent
📝 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: Piñon Hills, CA
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 7,149 residents in Piñon Hills, a small town within California. Piñon Hills households earn a median of $65,160 annually, below the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 18.3%. Typical homes in Piñon Hills are valued around $395,800, and the median resident age is 38.3 years. About 13.7% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 38.2% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
California carries a cost-of-living premium: the state registers 110.7 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Well Above Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $2,053 monthly. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts California's average monthly utility costs around $275 (state average). Natural-hazard exposure scores 88.7 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Very High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Piñon Hills'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 housing and income to work and mobility to comparison shortlist; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Piñon Hills, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares.
No matched row is reported here for within-city Census tract profiles, annual population history, local building permits, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
Question 1
How far does income reach against housing in Piñon Hills?
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 6.1 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 18.3%, 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. 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.
What does the journey to work look like in Piñon Hills?
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 83.2%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Which cities make useful reference points for Piñon Hills?
Within California, the closest population matches are Highgrove (7,164 residents, $109,657 income); Cottonwood CDP (Shasta County) (7,170 residents, $96,679 income); Kentfield (7,128 residents, $231,875 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Rayne, LA (7,147 residents); Withamsville, OH (7,151 residents); Millsboro, DE (7,152 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.
Below median income · poverty 18.3% (High poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
110.7 (US=100)
Highest-decile cost · BEA RPP 2024, California average
F
City profile score · Piñon Hills, CA
22/100
4 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.
Household income D
$65,160
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share F
13.7%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate F
18.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Cost of living F
110.7 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 N/A
N/A
No FBI UCR violent-crime rate for this place (coverage is incomplete).
Piñon Hills profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Household income: 42/100 (D) · $65,160
Bachelor's+ share: 17/100 (F) · 13.7%
Poverty rate: 16/100 (F) · 18.3%
Cost of living: 6/100 (F) · 110.7 index
How does Piñon Hills compare to other US cities?
Here's how Piñon Hills stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income43% higher than other cities
Home value77% pricier than other cities
Median rent88% pricier than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Piñon Hills against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to California only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
California-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Piñon Hills near the bottom of California's cities
Among the 1,458 California cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Piñon Hills ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Piñon Hills only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#981 of 1,338
27th percentile in California
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,458
0th percentile in California
Median Home Value
#871 of 1,343
35th percentile in California
Poverty Rate
#219 of 1,450
85th percentile in California
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#1,093 of 1,458
25th percentile in California
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 California only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
43rd percentile nationally for median household income. Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
How Piñon Hills's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$395,80023rd percentilemore affordable than 23% 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
Piñon Hills's home-value-to-income ratio: 6.1×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#14,155 of 15,516
More affordable than 9% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#10,496 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 6.1×, Piñon Hills sits in the pressured band:
national rank #14,155 of 15,516 and #10,496 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median, a comparison flag, not a verdict on any household.
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
$65,160Piñon Hills, CA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Piñon Hills, CA median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Piñon Hills, CA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)13.7%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)18.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)38.2%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
7,149
Median Income
$65,160
Median Home Value
$395,800
Median Age
38.3
Poverty Rate
18.3%
Labor force participation
38.2%
Bachelor's Degree+
13.7%
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
83.2%
Carpool
3.4%
Public Transit
0.2%
Walk
0.0%
Work from Home
13.3%
Based on 2,198 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
California statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $275
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across California at $275 (electricity about $150 , water and sewer about $70 ).
These are California statewide averages, not a meter reading for Piñon Hills. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
California's BEA cost-of-living index is 110.7 (Well Above Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Piñon Hills is $2,053/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to California statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 88.7 / 100 (Very High).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a California statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Piñon Hills sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Piñon Hills compares to similar-size California 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, 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.