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Place dossier plate
SheetMI-LUDINGTON-MI · Ludington, MI 7,664 pop · income 12th pct · 9 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 Ludington
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Ludington on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Albion · lowest
40,040
Albion · lowest
40,040 median HH income
24.1% of the leader · rank #1
Homewood · near
44,466
Homewood · near
44,466 median HH income
26.7% of the leader · rank #2
Ludington · this city
44,471
Ludington · this city
44,471 median HH income
26.7% of the leader · rank #3
Marion · near
44,472
Marion · near
44,472 median HH income
26.8% of the leader · rank #4
Spooner · near
44,474
Spooner · near
44,474 median HH income
26.8% of the leader · rank #5
Sisseton · near
44,477
Sisseton · near
44,477 median HH income
26.8% of the leader · rank #6
Gold River · highest
166,250
Gold River · highest
166,250 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 Ludington 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: 7,664.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Ludington - the verdict
Nationally, Ludington sits in the 12th 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.
12th
percentile, household income
41st
percentile, home value
32nd
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: Ludington, MI
7,664 people live in Ludington, Michigan - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Ludington report a median income of $44,471 per year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 17.7%. Home values in Ludington run a median of $192,800, and the median resident age is 43.8 years. About 27.1% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 47.4% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Housing supply pressure shows in Census Building Permit Survey data: 97 residential units were authorized in 2024 (Building Boom), up 593% from five years earlier. Ludington reports a comparatively low crime rate: per-100,000 total crime stands at 1147.5 in FBI UCR data, below the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). NOAA puts Ludington's yearly average temperature at 46.0°F.
Living costs in Michigan run below the national norm: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, Michigan scores 96.2 (Below Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $1,113 per month. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Michigan run around $238, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 49.6 out of 100 (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Ludington'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 population change to within-city variation to housing and income to reported crime to schools and households to work and mobility to comparison shortlist to climate and hazard context; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Ludington, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, annual population history, FBI reported-crime rates, local building permits, within-city Census tract profiles, matched public-school count.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
Is Ludington growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -49 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -0.6% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 97 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
The recent population line is broadly flat. That makes the composition of change more important than the headline count: housing turnover, household size, and age structure can shift even when the total barely moves.
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.
How far does income reach against housing in Ludington?
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 4.3 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 17.7%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Which cities make useful reference points for Ludington?
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 Michigan, the closest population matches are Hudsonville (7,711 residents, $88,606 income); St. Johns (7,712 residents, $63,030 income); Albion (7,608 residents, $40,040 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Seward, NE (7,665 residents); Thousand Palms, CA (7,662 residents); Gold River, CA (7,661 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.
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 Ludington?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 1147.5 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.
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.
Total reported rate
1147.5
Violent rate
211.0
Property rate
936.4
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
What does the education layer cover for Ludington?
The matched institution count is small, so district boundaries and schools outside the city line may matter more than the municipal count suggests. Use the number as a coverage cue, then verify attendance zones with the district before making a household decision.
The NCES join finds 1 public school within the city match. 27.1% 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
17.7%
Bachelor's degree+
27.1%
Matched public schools
1
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What does the journey to work look like in Ludington?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 68.0%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
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.
Drive alone
68.0%
Work from home
9.8%
Public transit
1.6%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 2,869 workers age 16+.
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.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 46.0°F. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Michigan is 49.6 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.
FEMA risk index (state avg)
49.6
Mean temperature
46.0°F
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Michigan average
F
City profile score · Ludington, MI
35/100
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 C
96.2 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Bachelor's+ share C-
27.1%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime D
211 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Poverty rate F
17.7%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income F
$44,471
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Ludington profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 57/100 (C) · 96.2 index
Bachelor's+ share: 53/100 (C-) · 27.1%
Violent crime: 46/100 (D) · 211 /100k
Poverty rate: 18/100 (F) · 17.7%
Household income: 13/100 (F) · $44,471
Where Ludington sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Ludington'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 - Ludington highlighted among 8 peers.Read the chart values
Ludington, MI (this city): home $192,800, crime 1,148/100k
Seward, NE : home $232,500, crime 731/100k
New Albany, MS : home $150,000, crime 1,216/100k
Ashland, VA : home $272,600, crime 2,695/100k
St. Johns, MI : home $175,300, crime 688/100k
Albion, MI : home $91,100, crime 4,132/100k
Brighton, MI : home $302,800, crime 1,339/100k
Grand Ledge, MI : home $189,300, crime 707/100k
How does Ludington compare to other US cities?
Ludington measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income12% higher than other cities
Home value41% pricier than other cities
Median rent32% pricier than other cities
Safety58% 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 Michigan alone, Ludington ranks #117 of 254 Michigan 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 Ludington against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Michigan only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Michigan-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Ludington near the bottom of Michigan's cities
Among the 727 Michigan cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Ludington ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Ludington only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#601 of 718
16th percentile in Michigan
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 727
0th percentile in Michigan
Median Home Value
#237 of 721
67th percentile in Michigan
Poverty Rate
#106 of 727
85th percentile in Michigan
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#230 of 727
68th percentile in Michigan
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 Michigan only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
12th percentile nationally for median household income · 58th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Ludington's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Ludington'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 Ludington's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$192,800Among the most affordablemore affordable than 59% 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
Ludington's home-value-to-income ratio: 4.3×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#11,618 of 15,516
More affordable than 25% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#8,944 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 4.3×, Ludington sits in the moderate band:
national rank #11,618 of 15,516 and #8,944 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
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
$44,471Ludington, MI median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Ludington, MI median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Ludington, MI.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)27.1%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)17.7%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)47.4%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
7,664
Median Income
$44,471
Median Home Value
$192,800
Median Age
43.8
Poverty Rate
17.7%
Labor force participation
47.4%
Bachelor's Degree+
27.1%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1147.5
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
211.0
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
936.4
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
46.0°F
Annual Precipitation
N/A
Annual Snowfall
N/A
Schools
Total Schools
1
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Ludington's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
7,683 residents
2021
7,743 residents
2022
7,721 residents
2023
7,631 residents
2024
7,572 residents
2025
7,634 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📈 Building Boom
Total Permits (2024)
97
housing units authorized
Single-Family
0
detached homes
Multifamily
97
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
12.7
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
14
9
5
$4.9M
2020
18
2
16
$2.5M
2021
20
2
18
$2.6M
2022
1
1
0
$0.6M
2023
2
2
0
$0.6M
2024
97
0
97
$24.3M
Permit volume increased 593% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
68.0%
Carpool
17.1%
Public Transit
1.6%
Walk
2.0%
Work from Home
9.8%
Other
1.5%
Based on 2,869 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Michigan statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $238
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Michigan at $238 (electricity about $105 , water and sewer about $48 ).
These are Michigan statewide averages, not a meter reading for Ludington. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Michigan's BEA cost-of-living index is 96.2 (Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Ludington is $1,113/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Michigan statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 49.6 / 100 (Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Michigan statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Ludington sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Ludington compares to similar-size Michigan 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 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.