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Place dossier plate
SheetCA-RED-BLUFF-CA · Red Bluff, CA 14,592 pop · income 20th pct · 14 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 Red Bluff
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Red Bluff on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
South English · lowest
50,208
South English · lowest
50,208 median HH income
20.1% of the leader · rank #1
Concordia · near
50,213
Concordia · near
50,213 median HH income
20.1% of the leader · rank #2
Louisville · near
50,214
Louisville · near
50,214 median HH income
20.1% of the leader · rank #3
Ranshaw · near
50,215
Ranshaw · near
50,215 median HH income
20.1% of the leader · rank #4
Red Bluff · this city
50,216
Red Bluff · this city
50,216 median HH income
20.1% of the leader · rank #5
Alamo · highest
250,001
Alamo · highest
250,001 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #6
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 Red Bluff 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: 14,592.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Red Bluff - the verdict
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Red Bluff lands in the 20th percentile for household income and the 3rd percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
20th
percentile, household income
60th
percentile, home value
88th
percentile, median rent
3rd
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: Red Bluff, CA
14,592 people live in Red Bluff, California - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. The typical household in Red Bluff brings in $50,216 a year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 15.4%. Red Bluff's housing stock carries a median value of $271,100, and the median resident age is 35.2 years. 12.9% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 49.3% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 0 residential units authorized here in 2024 (No Permits), down 100% from five years earlier. Red Bluff's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: FBI UCR figures show 5527.3 crimes per 100,000 residents, above the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score).
California carries a cost-of-living premium: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, California scores 110.7 (Well Above Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $2,053 per month. Monthly utility costs average around $275 across California, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. Commute times here average 16.9 minutes, with 77.9% driving alone and 8.7% working from home, per Census ACS commuting data. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 88.7 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Very High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Red Bluff'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 population change to comparison shortlist to reported crime to within-city variation 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 Red Bluff, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, matched public-school count, FBI reported-crime rates, within-city Census tract profiles, annual population history, local building permits.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
How far does income reach against housing in Red Bluff?
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 5.4 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 15.4%, 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.
Is Red Bluff 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 -331 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -2.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 0 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Which cities make useful reference points for Red Bluff?
Within California, the closest population matches are Cherryland (14,575 residents, $84,858 income); Parlier (14,545 residents, $50,910 income); Salida (14,457 residents, $91,990 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Falls Church, VA (14,593 residents); Great Bend, KS (14,596 residents); Swansea, IL (14,603 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.
What can 14 Census tracts reveal inside Red Bluff?
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 14 Census tracts to this city.
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 Red Bluff?
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 5527.3 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 142% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
4250.1
Violent rate
1277.1
Total reported rate
5527.3
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
What does the education layer cover for Red Bluff?
The NCES join finds 16 public schools within the city match. 12.9% 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
16
Bachelor's degree+
12.9%
Poverty estimate
15.4%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Red Bluff?
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 77.9%. The reported mean trip to work is 16.9 minutes.
Public transit
0.0%
Work from home
8.7%
Drive alone
77.9%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 5,117 workers age 16+.
Highest-decile cost · BEA RPP 2024, California average
F
City profile score · Red Bluff, CA
13/100
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.
Poverty rate F
15.4%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income F
$50,216
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share F
12.9%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
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 F
1,277 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Red Bluff profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Poverty rate: 22/100 (F) · 15.4%
Household income: 21/100 (F) · $50,216
Bachelor's+ share: 14/100 (F) · 12.9%
Cost of living: 6/100 (F) · 110.7 index
Violent crime: 0/100 (F) · 1,277 /100k
Where Red Bluff sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Red Bluff'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 - Red Bluff highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Red Bluff, CA (this city): home $271,100, crime 5,527/100k
Falls Church, VA : home $1,005,400, crime 1,622/100k
Great Bend, KS : home $118,700, crime 1,872/100k
Swansea, IL : home $211,700, crime 785/100k
Fraser, MI : home $193,600, crime 2,181/100k
Alexandria, MN : home $247,200, crime 1,810/100k
Parlier, CA : home $236,100, crime 1,864/100k
Livingston, CA : home $339,800, crime 1,779/100k
California City, CA : home $239,600, crime 2,176/100k
How does Red Bluff compare to other US cities?
Here's how Red Bluff stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income20% higher than other cities
Home value60% pricier than other cities
Median rent88% pricier than other cities
Safety3% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just California and the picture shifts: Red Bluff ranks #427 of 441 California cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Red Bluff 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 Red Bluff near the bottom of California's cities
Among the 1,458 California cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Red Bluff ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Red Bluff only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1,185 of 1,338
11th percentile in California
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,458
0th percentile in California
Median Home Value
#1,121 of 1,343
17th percentile in California
Poverty Rate
#290 of 1,450
80th percentile in California
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#1,118 of 1,458
23rd 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
20th percentile nationally for median household income · 3rd percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Red Bluff's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Red Bluff'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 Red Bluff's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$271,10040th percentilemore affordable than 40% 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
Red Bluff's home-value-to-income ratio: 5.4×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#13,446 of 15,516
More affordable than 13% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#2,777 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 5.4×, Red Bluff sits in the pressured band:
national rank #13,446 of 15,516 and #2,777 of 3,317small cities (10,000–49,999).
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
$50,216Red Bluff, CA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Red Bluff, 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 Red Bluff, CA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)12.9%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)15.4%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)49.3%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
14,592
Median Income
$50,216
Median Home Value
$271,100
Median Age
35.2
Poverty Rate
15.4%
Labor force participation
49.3%
Bachelor's Degree+
12.9%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
5527.3
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
1277.1
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
4250.1
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
16
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Red Bluff's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
14,735 residents
2021
14,609 residents
2022
14,566 residents
2023
14,438 residents
2024
14,385 residents
2025
14,404 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
Total Permits (2024)
0
housing units authorized
Single-Family
0
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
2
2
0
$0.6M
2020
8
8
0
$2.2M
2021
7
3
4
$1.0M
2022
4
4
0
$1.1M
2023
2
0
2
$0.4M
2024
0
0
0
-
Permit volume decreased 100% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
16.9 minutes
Drive Alone
77.9%
Carpool
10.2%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
1.8%
Work from Home
8.7%
Other
1.4%
Based on 5,117 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 Red Bluff. 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 Red Bluff 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 Red Bluff sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Red Bluff 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, 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.