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Place dossier plate
SheetCA-SCOTTS-VALLEY-CA · Scotts Valley, CA 12,138 pop · income 93rd 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 Scotts Valley
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Scotts Valley on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Somerset · lowest
32,910
Somerset · lowest
32,910 median HH income
13.8% of the leader · rank #1
Fox Point · near
140,818
Fox Point · near
140,818 median HH income
59.1% of the leader · rank #2
Naples · near
140,833
Naples · near
140,833 median HH income
59.1% of the leader · rank #3
Park City · near
140,875
Park City · near
140,875 median HH income
59.2% of the leader · rank #4
Scotts Valley · this city
140,887
Scotts Valley · this city
140,887 median HH income
59.2% of the leader · rank #5
Rivanna · near
140,903
Rivanna · near
140,903 median HH income
59.2% of the leader · rank #6
Tamalpais-Hom… · highest
238,158
Tamalpais-Hom… · highest
238,158 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 Scotts Valley 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: 12,138.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Scotts Valley - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Scotts Valley places in the 93rd percentile for household income and the 35th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
93rd
percentile, household income
98th
percentile, home value
88th
percentile, median rent
35th
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: Scotts Valley, CA
12,138 people live in Scotts Valley, California - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Scotts Valley report a median income of $140,887 per year, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 0.7%. Home values in Scotts Valley run a median of $1,092,000, and the median resident age is 47.8 years. About 54.4% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 62.6% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 2 residential building permits were authorized in Scotts Valley (Construction Slowdown), down 67% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Crime here tracks close to the national norm: FBI UCR reporting places total crime at 1904.0 incidents per 100,000 residents, near the national average (voluntary agency reporting, reflects reporting activity, not 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. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $2,053 per month statewide. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in California run around $275, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Workers in Scotts Valley report an average commute of 18.7 minutes, with 66.7% driving alone and 24.5% working from home. 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 Scotts Valley'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 work and mobility to housing and income to reported crime to schools and households to population change; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Scotts Valley, city-specific coverage includes annual population history, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, local building permits.
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.
1. Comparison shortlist
Which cities make useful reference points for Scotts Valley?
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 California, the closest population matches are Tamalpais-Homestead Valley (12,153 residents, $238,158 income); Commerce (12,072 residents, $71,768 income); San Marino (12,279 residents, $187,633 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Macedonia, OH (12,142 residents); Gardere, LA (12,130 residents); Richmond, TX (12,117 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 Scotts Valley?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 66.7%. The reported mean trip to work is 18.7 minutes.
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.
How far does income reach against housing in Scotts Valley?
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 7.8 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 0.7%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Scotts Valley?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 1904.0 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 17% 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.
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.
Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Scotts Valley?
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 4 public schools within the city match. 54.4% 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.
Poverty estimate
0.7%
Bachelor's degree+
54.4%
Matched public schools
4
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
Is Scotts Valley growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -571 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -4.7% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 2 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
12,223
2025 estimate
11,652
Period change
-4.7%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
Top-decile income · poverty 0.7% (Very low poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
110.7 (US=100)
Highest-decile cost · BEA RPP 2024, California average
C+
City profile score · Scotts Valley, CA
63/100
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 A+
0.7%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income A+
$140,887
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share A
54.4%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime F
306 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger 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.
Scotts Valley profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Poverty rate: 95/100 (A+) · 0.7%
Household income: 93/100 (A+) · $140,887
Bachelor's+ share: 88/100 (A) · 54.4%
Violent crime: 32/100 (F) · 306 /100k
Cost of living: 6/100 (F) · 110.7 index
Where Scotts Valley sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Scotts Valley'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 - Scotts Valley highlighted among 27 peers.Read the chart values
Scotts Valley, CA (this city): home $1,092,000, crime 1,904/100k
Richmond, TX : home $229,800, crime 2,990/100k
Somerset, KY : home $140,900, crime 1,334/100k
Commerce, CA : home $583,200, crime 13,808/100k
San Marino, CA : home $2,000,000+, crime 1,210/100k
Newman, CA : home $381,900, crime 543/100k
Tehachapi, CA : home $344,700, crime 3,124/100k
New York, NY : home $751,700, crime 3,039/100k
Los Angeles, CA : home $879,500, crime 2,212/100k
Chicago, IL : home $315,200, crime 4,012/100k
Houston, TX : home $253,400, crime 5,442/100k
Phoenix, AZ : home $381,900, crime 3,125/100k
Philadelphia, PA : home $232,400, crime 5,457/100k
San Antonio, TX : home $219,700, crime 5,218/100k
San Diego, CA : home $848,500, crime 2,082/100k
Dallas, TX : home $295,300, crime 4,010/100k
San Jose, CA : home $1,187,800, crime 3,195/100k
Austin, TX : home $512,700, crime 3,709/100k
Fort Worth, TX : home $277,300, crime 3,158/100k
Columbus, OH : home $234,500, crime 3,088/100k
Indianapolis, IN : home $207,000, crime 4,214/100k
San Francisco, CA : home $1,380,500, crime 4,526/100k
Seattle, WA : home $912,100, crime 5,783/100k
Denver, CO : home $586,700, crime 5,755/100k
Oklahoma City, OK : home $215,100, crime 3,570/100k
El Paso, TX : home $171,700, crime 1,772/100k
Washington, DC : home $724,600, crime 4,514/100k
How does Scotts Valley compare to other US cities?
Here's how Scotts Valley stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income93% higher than other cities
Home value98% pricier than other cities
Median rent88% pricier than other cities
Safety35% 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 California alone, Scotts Valley ranks #221 of 441 California 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 Scotts Valley 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 Scotts Valley near the bottom of California's cities
Among the 1,458 California cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Scotts Valley ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Scotts Valley only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#210 of 1,338
84th percentile in California
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,458
0th percentile in California
Median Home Value
#199 of 1,343
85th percentile in California
Poverty Rate
#1,182 of 1,450
18th percentile in California
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#226 of 1,458
84th 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
93rd percentile nationally for median household income · 35th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Scotts Valley's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Scotts Valley'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 Scotts Valley's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$1,092,0002nd percentilemore affordable than 2% 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
Scotts Valley's home-value-to-income ratio: 7.8×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#14,952 of 15,516
More affordable than 4% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#3,184 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 7.8×, Scotts Valley sits in the pressured band:
national rank #14,952 of 15,516 and #3,184 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
$140,887Scotts Valley, CA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Scotts Valley, 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 Scotts Valley, CA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)54.4%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)0.7%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)62.6%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
12,138
Median Income
$140,887
Median Home Value
$1,092,000
Median Age
47.8
Poverty Rate
0.7%
Labor force participation
62.6%
Bachelor's Degree+
54.4%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1904.0
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
306.0
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1598.0
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
4
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Scotts Valley's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
12,223 residents
2021
12,182 residents
2022
12,031 residents
2023
11,894 residents
2024
11,773 residents
2025
11,652 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
2
housing units authorized
Single-Family
2
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.2
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
6
6
0
$1.3M
2020
11
11
0
$2.5M
2021
34
34
0
$11.7M
2022
44
44
0
$16.7M
2023
2
2
0
$0.6M
2024
2
2
0
$1.1M
Permit volume decreased 67% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
18.7 minutes
Drive Alone
66.7%
Carpool
3.6%
Public Transit
0.4%
Walk
1.7%
Work from Home
24.5%
Other
3.1%
Based on 6,142 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 Scotts Valley. 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 Scotts Valley 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 Scotts Valley sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Scotts Valley 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.