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Place dossier plate
SheetMI-MELVINDALE-MI · Melvindale, MI 12,605 pop · income 9th 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 Melvindale
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Melvindale on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Escanaba · lowest
40,169
Escanaba · lowest
40,169 median HH income
22.3% of the leader · rank #1
Sandy Level · near
41,349
Sandy Level · near
41,349 median HH income
22.9% of the leader · rank #2
Lovelock · near
41,350
Lovelock · near
41,350 median HH income
22.9% of the leader · rank #3
Brasher Falls · near
41,354
Brasher Falls · near
41,354 median HH income
22.9% of the leader · rank #4
Melvindale · this city
41,356
Melvindale · this city
41,356 median HH income
22.9% of the leader · rank #5
Bartlett · near
41,360
Bartlett · near
41,360 median HH income
22.9% of the leader · rank #6
Lansdowne · highest
180,379
Lansdowne · highest
180,379 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 Melvindale 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: 12,605.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Melvindale - the verdict
Nationally, Melvindale sits in the 9th percentile for household income and the 47th percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
9th
percentile, household income
14th
percentile, home value
32nd
percentile, median rent
47th
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: Melvindale, MI
Melvindale is a small town in Michigan, home to 12,605 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Median household income here is $41,356 per year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 26.1%. Typical homes in Melvindale are valued around $113,100, and the median resident age is 31.6 years. Educational attainment runs 15.0% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 54.1% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 0 residential building permits were authorized in Melvindale (No Permits), down 100% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Melvindale reports a comparatively low crime rate: FBI UCR figures show 1467.4 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).
Living costs in Michigan run below the national norm: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Michigan at 96.2 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Below Average). Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,113 monthly. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in Michigan run around $238, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Natural-hazard exposure scores 49.6 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Melvindale'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 schools and households to work and mobility to population change to comparison shortlist to reported crime; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Melvindale, city-specific coverage includes local building permits, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, annual population history, commute-mode shares.
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.
Question 1
How far does income reach against housing in Melvindale?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 2.7 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 26.1%, 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.
What does the education layer cover for Melvindale?
The NCES join finds 4 public schools within the city match. 15.0% 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.
What does the journey to work look like in Melvindale?
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 64.0%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Which cities make useful reference points for Melvindale?
Within Michigan, the closest population matches are Woodhaven (12,761 residents, $83,291 income); Escanaba (12,374 residents, $40,169 income); Rochester (12,939 residents, $104,920 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Goldenrod, FL (12,603 residents); Lewisburg, TN (12,607 residents); Lansdowne, VA (12,603 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.
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.
Population change
Is Melvindale 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 -484 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -3.8% 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.
Period change
-3.8%
2025 estimate
12,325
2020 estimate
12,809
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Melvindale?
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 1467.4 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 36% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
1165.7
Violent rate
301.6
Total reported rate
1467.4
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Lowest-decile income · poverty 26.1% (Highest-decile poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
96.2 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Michigan average
F
City profile score · Melvindale, MI
24/100
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.
Violent crime F
302 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share F
15.0%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income F
$41,356
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
26.1%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Melvindale profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 57/100 (C) · 96.2 index
Violent crime: 33/100 (F) · 302 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 20/100 (F) · 15.0%
Household income: 9/100 (F) · $41,356
Poverty rate: 5/100 (F) · 26.1%
Where Melvindale sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Melvindale'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 - Melvindale highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Melvindale, MI (this city): home $113,100, crime 1,467/100k
Lewisburg, TN : home $183,400, crime 2,648/100k
Fulton, MO : home $144,500, crime 1,295/100k
Woodhaven, MI : home $221,200, crime 1,655/100k
Escanaba, MI : home $116,600, crime 2,354/100k
Rochester, MI : home $450,800, crime 401/100k
Riverview, MI : home $200,500, crime 1,142/100k
Ionia, MI : home $161,100, crime 740/100k
New Baltimore, MI : home $309,800, crime 443/100k
How does Melvindale compare to other US cities?
Where Melvindale sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income9% higher than other cities
Home value14% pricier than other cities
Median rent32% pricier than other cities
Safety47% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Michigan and the picture shifts: Melvindale ranks #151 of 254 Michigan cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Melvindale 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 Melvindale near the bottom of Michigan's cities
Among the 727 Michigan cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Melvindale ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Melvindale only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#643 of 718
10th percentile in Michigan
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 727
0th percentile in Michigan
Median Home Value
#508 of 721
30th percentile in Michigan
Poverty Rate
#37 of 727
95th percentile in Michigan
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#477 of 727
34th 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
9th percentile nationally for median household income · 47th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Melvindale's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Melvindale'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 Melvindale's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$113,100Among the most affordablemore affordable than 86% 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
Melvindale's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#5,227 of 15,516
More affordable than 66% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#588 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 2.7×, Melvindale sits in the affordable band:
national rank #5,227 of 15,516 and #588 of 3,317small cities (10,000–49,999).
The multiple is comparatively compact among tracked cities, but a low ratio can still coexist with slow demand or household-level hardship.
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
$41,356Melvindale, MI median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Melvindale, 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 Melvindale, MI.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)15.0%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)26.1%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)54.1%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
12,605
Median Income
$41,356
Median Home Value
$113,100
Median Age
31.6
Poverty Rate
26.1%
Labor force participation
54.1%
Bachelor's Degree+
15.0%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1467.4
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
301.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1165.7
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
Melvindale's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
12,809 residents
2021
12,654 residents
2022
12,471 residents
2023
12,370 residents
2024
12,358 residents
2025
12,325 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
4
4
0
$0.8M
2020
1
1
0
$0.2M
2021
19
4
15
$3.0M
2022
0
0
0
-
2023
2
2
0
$0.8M
2024
0
0
0
-
Permit volume decreased 100% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
64.0%
Carpool
27.4%
Public Transit
0.9%
Walk
0.5%
Work from Home
7.2%
Based on 4,943 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 Melvindale. 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 Melvindale 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 Melvindale sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Melvindale 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, 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.