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Place dossier plate
SheetDE-LEWES-DE · Lewes, DE 3,415 pop · income 73rd 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 Lewes
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Lewes on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Windsor · lowest
38,631
Windsor · lowest
38,631 median HH income
27.7% of the leader · rank #1
Combine · near
92,360
Combine · near
92,360 median HH income
66.2% of the leader · rank #2
Whittier · near
92,374
Whittier · near
92,374 median HH income
66.2% of the leader · rank #3
Lewes · this city
92,375
Lewes · this city
92,375 median HH income
66.2% of the leader · rank #4
Moreland · near
92,375
Moreland · near
92,375 median HH income
66.2% of the leader · rank #5
Royal Palm Be… · near
92,382
Royal Palm Be… · near
92,382 median HH income
66.2% of the leader · rank #6
Greenville · highest
139,541
Greenville · highest
139,541 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 Lewes 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: 3,415.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Lewes - the verdict
Lewes ranks in the 73rd percentile for household income and the 77th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
73rd
percentile, household income
95th
percentile, home value
78th
percentile, median rent
77th
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: Lewes, DE
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 3,415 residents in Lewes, a small town within Delaware. The typical household in Lewes brings in $92,375 a year, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 2.5%. Lewes's housing stock carries a median value of $806,700, and the median resident age is 67.3 years. Educational attainment runs 65.2% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 39.1% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Lewes reports a comparatively low crime rate: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 701.9 total incidents per 100,000 residents here, below the national average (agency reporting is voluntary, so this measures reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). NOAA climate normals record an annual average temperature of 58.5°F with 47.3 inches of precipitation per year and 10.5 inches of snowfall.
Delaware tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: the state registers 99.8 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Near Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $1,560 per month. Monthly utility costs average around $243 across Delaware, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. Commute times here average 19.2 minutes, with 62.6% driving alone and 29.3% working from home, per Census ACS commuting data. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 91.3 out of 100 (Very High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Lewes'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 work and mobility to reported crime to comparison shortlist to population change to housing and income to schools and households to climate and hazard context; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Lewes, city-specific coverage includes matched public-school count, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, annual population history.
No matched row is reported here for within-city Census tract profiles, local building permits; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Work and mobility
What does the journey to work look like in Lewes?
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.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 62.6%. The reported mean trip to work is 19.2 minutes.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Lewes?
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 701.9 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 69% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Which cities make useful reference points for Lewes?
Within Delaware, the closest population matches are Milton (3,469 residents, $64,906 income); Highland Acres (3,661 residents, $101,685 income); Greenville (3,100 residents, $139,541 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Avon, NY (3,415 residents); Tomahawk, WI (3,416 residents); Windsor, NC (3,417 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.
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.
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +471 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +14.0% change. No comparable local building-permit series is available here, so population change should not be read as a housing-supply measure. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
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 Lewes?
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 8.7 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 2.5%, 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.
Household income
$92,375
Home value
$806,700
Value / income
8.7×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
The NCES join finds 5 public schools within the city match. 65.2% 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
5
Bachelor's degree+
65.2%
Poverty estimate
2.5%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 58.5°F, with 47.3 inches of precipitation and 10.5 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Delaware is 91.3 out of 100. Climate normals describe long-run weather; the FEMA score on PlainCities is a state average of county NRI inputs and combines hazards, exposure, vulnerability, and resilience.
The two sources should not be blended into one comfort or safety score. Use the climate values for baseline conditions and the risk index as a prompt to inspect specific hazards, insurance, and local emergency guidance for a particular address.
Mean temperature
58.5°F
Annual precipitation
47.3 in
FEMA risk index (state avg)
91.3
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Delaware average
B-
City profile score · Lewes, DE
68/100
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.
Bachelor's+ share A+
65.2%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate A-
2.5%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income B
$92,375
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Violent crime C
162 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Cost of living D
99.8 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Lewes profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 95/100 (A+) · 65.2%
Poverty rate: 82/100 (A-) · 2.5%
Household income: 72/100 (B) · $92,375
Violent crime: 55/100 (C) · 162 /100k
Cost of living: 41/100 (D) · 99.8 index
Where Lewes sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Lewes'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 - Lewes highlighted among 26 peers.Read the chart values
Lewes, DE (this city): home $806,700, crime 702/100k
Tomahawk, WI : home $168,200, crime 713/100k
Windsor, NC : home $111,400, crime 1,649/100k
Milton, DE : home $376,600, crime 1,266/100k
Harrington, DE : home $222,100, crime 2,443/100k
Selbyville, DE : home $410,700, crime 1,522/100k
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 Lewes compare to other US cities?
Here's how Lewes stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income73% higher than other cities
Home value95% pricier than other cities
Median rent78% pricier than other cities
Safety77% 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 Delaware alone, Lewes ranks #4 of 31 Delaware 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 Lewes against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Delaware only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Delaware-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Lewes near the bottom of Delaware's cities
Among the 79 Delaware cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Lewes ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Lewes only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#26 of 77
66th percentile in Delaware
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 79
0th percentile in Delaware
Median Home Value
#7 of 77
91st percentile in Delaware
Poverty Rate
#59 of 79
24th percentile in Delaware
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#9 of 79
89th percentile in Delaware
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 Delaware only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
73rd percentile nationally for median household income · 77th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Lewes's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Lewes'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 Lewes's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$806,7005th percentilemore affordable than 5% 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
Lewes's home-value-to-income ratio: 8.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#15,202 of 15,516
More affordable than 2% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#11,136 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 8.7×, Lewes sits in the pressured band:
national rank #15,202 of 15,516 and #11,136 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
$92,375Lewes, DE median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Lewes, DE median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Lewes, DE.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)65.2%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)2.5%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)39.1%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
3,415
Median Income
$92,375
Median Home Value
$806,700
Median Age
67.3
Poverty Rate
2.5%
Labor force participation
39.1%
Bachelor's Degree+
65.2%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
701.9
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
162.0
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
540.0
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.
Climate
Avg Temperature
58.5°F
Annual Precipitation
47.3"
Annual Snowfall
10.5"
Schools
Total Schools
5
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Lewes's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
3,355 residents
2021
3,454 residents
2022
3,559 residents
2023
3,656 residents
2024
3,750 residents
2025
3,826 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
19.2 minutes
Drive Alone
62.6%
Carpool
3.2%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
4.8%
Work from Home
29.3%
Based on 1,201 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Delaware statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $243
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Delaware at $243 (electricity about $115 , water and sewer about $48 ).
These are Delaware statewide averages, not a meter reading for Lewes. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Delaware's BEA cost-of-living index is 99.8 (Near Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Lewes is $1,560/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Delaware statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 91.3 / 100 (Very High).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Delaware statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Lewes sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Lewes compares to similar-size Delaware 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, NOAA Climate Normals, NCES CCD, 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.