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Place dossier plate
SheetKY-SHELBYVILLE-KY · Shelbyville, KY 17,436 pop · income 55th pct · 12 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 Shelbyville
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Shelbyville on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Selma · lowest
32,184
Selma · lowest
32,184 median HH income
20.1% of the leader · rank #1
Denton · near
73,719
Denton · near
73,719 median HH income
46.1% of the leader · rank #2
Homer · near
73,723
Homer · near
73,723 median HH income
46.1% of the leader · rank #3
Toftrees · near
73,724
Toftrees · near
73,724 median HH income
46.1% of the leader · rank #4
Racine · near
73,724
Racine · near
73,724 median HH income
46.1% of the leader · rank #5
Shelbyville · this city
73,733
Shelbyville · this city
73,733 median HH income
46.1% of the leader · rank #6
Burke Centre · highest
159,932
Burke Centre · highest
159,932 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 Shelbyville 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: 17,436.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Shelbyville - the verdict
Nationally, Shelbyville sits in the 55th percentile for household income and the 58th percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
55th
percentile, household income
53rd
percentile, home value
10th
percentile, median rent
58th
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: Shelbyville, KY
17,436 people live in Shelbyville, Kentucky - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. The typical household in Shelbyville brings in $73,733 a year, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 8.7%. Shelbyville's housing stock carries a median value of $238,600, and the median resident age is 36.8 years. 25.3% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 66.7% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Shelbyville reports a comparatively low crime rate: FBI UCR figures show 1141.5 crimes per 100,000 residents, below the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score). The annual average temperature per NOAA climate normals runs 53.5°F with 49.8 inches of precipitation per year.
Living costs in Kentucky run below the national norm: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, Kentucky scores 90.2 (Well Below Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $984 monthly. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Kentucky run around $225, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 44.2 out of 100 (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Shelbyville'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 population change to comparison shortlist to schools and households to within-city variation to climate and hazard context to reported crime to housing and income; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Shelbyville, city-specific coverage includes within-city Census tract profiles, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, annual population history, matched public-school count.
No matched row is reported here for 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 Shelbyville?
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 78.0%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Is Shelbyville growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
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 +1,098 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +6.3% 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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Shelbyville?
Within Kentucky, the closest population matches are St. Matthews (17,491 residents, $80,716 income); Fort Thomas (17,242 residents, $100,819 income); Danville (17,235 residents, $53,370 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Kingstowne, VA (17,436 residents); Auburndale, FL (17,438 residents); Heber, UT (17,438 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 12 Census tracts reveal inside Shelbyville?
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 12 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.
Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Shelbyville?
The NCES join finds 11 public schools within the city match. 25.3% 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
11
Bachelor's degree+
25.3%
Poverty estimate
8.7%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What physical conditions frame life in Shelbyville?
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 53.5°F, with 49.8 inches of precipitation. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Kentucky is 44.2 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
53.5°F
Annual precipitation
49.8 in
FEMA risk index (state avg)
44.2
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Shelbyville?
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 1141.5 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 50% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
1007.9
Violent rate
133.6
Total reported rate
1141.5
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
How far does income reach against housing in Shelbyville?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.2 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 8.7%, 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. 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.
Household income
$73,733
Home value
$238,600
Value / income
3.2×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Above median income · poverty 8.7% (Above-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
90.2 (US=100)
Affordable · BEA RPP 2024, Kentucky average
C
City profile score · Shelbyville, KY
59/100
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
90.2 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 C+
134 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income C-
$73,733
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share C-
25.3%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate D
8.7%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Shelbyville profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 85/100 (A) · 90.2 index
Violent crime: 62/100 (C+) · 134 /100k
Household income: 53/100 (C-) · $73,733
Bachelor's+ share: 50/100 (C-) · 25.3%
Poverty rate: 45/100 (D) · 8.7%
Where Shelbyville sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Shelbyville'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 - Shelbyville highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Shelbyville, KY (this city): home $238,600, crime 1,142/100k
Auburndale, FL : home $272,700, crime 2,334/100k
Heber, UT : home $571,300, crime 1,122/100k
Selma, AL : home $102,500, crime 3,092/100k
St. Matthews, KY : home $325,700, crime 5,223/100k
Fort Thomas, KY : home $301,400, crime 535/100k
Danville, KY : home $202,200, crime 1,155/100k
Murray, KY : home $193,300, crime 1,528/100k
Mount Washington, KY : home $253,700, crime 590/100k
How does Shelbyville compare to other US cities?
Where Shelbyville sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income55% higher than other cities
Home value53% pricier than other cities
Median rent10% pricier than other cities
Safety58% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
National percentiles can mask local variation. Looking only at Kentucky, Shelbyville ranks #123 of 181 Kentucky cities by lowest crime rate - a narrower, more locally useful cut than the national comparison above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Shelbyville against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Kentucky only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Kentucky-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Shelbyville near the bottom of Kentucky's cities
Among the 520 Kentucky cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Shelbyville ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Shelbyville only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#147 of 485
70th percentile in Kentucky
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 520
0th percentile in Kentucky
Median Home Value
#106 of 484
78th percentile in Kentucky
Poverty Rate
#307 of 519
40th percentile in Kentucky
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#184 of 520
64th percentile in Kentucky
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 Kentucky only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
55th percentile nationally for median household income · 58th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Shelbyville's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Shelbyville'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 Shelbyville's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$238,60047th percentilemore affordable than 47% 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
Shelbyville's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.2×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#7,855 of 15,516
More affordable than 49% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#1,217 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.2×, Shelbyville sits in the moderate band:
national rank #7,855 of 15,516 and #1,217 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
$73,733Shelbyville, KY median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Shelbyville, KY median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Shelbyville, KY.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)25.3%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)8.7%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)66.7%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
17,436
Median Income
$73,733
Median Home Value
$238,600
Median Age
36.8
Poverty Rate
8.7%
Labor force participation
66.7%
Bachelor's Degree+
25.3%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1141.5
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
133.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1007.9
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
53.5°F
Annual Precipitation
49.8"
Annual Snowfall
N/A
Schools
Total Schools
11
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Shelbyville's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
17,355 residents
2021
17,471 residents
2022
17,594 residents
2023
17,878 residents
2024
18,187 residents
2025
18,453 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
78.0%
Carpool
12.0%
Public Transit
0.2%
Walk
0.2%
Work from Home
8.9%
Other
0.7%
Based on 8,790 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Kentucky statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $225
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Kentucky at $225 (electricity about $115 , water and sewer about $40 ).
These are Kentucky statewide averages, not a meter reading for Shelbyville. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Kentucky's BEA cost-of-living index is 90.2 (Well Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Shelbyville is $984/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Kentucky statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 44.2 / 100 (Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Kentucky statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Shelbyville sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Shelbyville compares to similar-size Kentucky 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.