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Place dossier plate
SheetNC-GRANITE-FALLS-NC · Granite Falls, NC 4,921 pop · income 55th 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 Granite Falls
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Granite Falls on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Wadesboro · lowest
34,125
Wadesboro · lowest
34,125 median HH income
38.4% of the leader · rank #1
Granite Falls · this city
74,250
Granite Falls · this city
74,250 median HH income
83.6% of the leader · rank #2
Petaluma Cent… · near
74,250
Petaluma Cent… · near
74,250 median HH income
83.6% of the leader · rank #3
Berkshire Lak… · near
74,250
Berkshire Lak… · near
74,250 median HH income
83.6% of the leader · rank #4
Sunset · near
74,250
Sunset · near
74,250 median HH income
83.6% of the leader · rank #5
Hartford · near
74,252
Hartford · near
74,252 median HH income
83.6% of the leader · rank #6
Herculaneum · highest
88,778
Herculaneum · highest
88,778 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 Granite Falls 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: 4,921.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Granite Falls - the verdict
Granite Falls ranks in the 55th percentile for household income and the 14th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
55th
percentile, household income
44th
percentile, home value
48th
percentile, median rent
14th
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: Granite Falls, NC
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 4,921 residents in Granite Falls, a small town within North Carolina. Households in Granite Falls report a median income of $74,250 per year, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 9.6%. Home values in Granite Falls run a median of $203,100, and the median resident age is 42.4 years. 27.2% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 55.6% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Granite Falls's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: per-100,000 total crime stands at 3178.5 in FBI UCR data, above the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Living costs in North Carolina run below the national norm: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, North Carolina scores 94.3 (Below Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $1,161 per month statewide. Monthly utility costs average around $215 across North Carolina, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 66.7 out of 100 (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Granite Falls'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 schools and households to reported crime to population change to comparison shortlist to housing and income to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Granite Falls, city-specific coverage includes annual population history, commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count.
No matched row is reported here for local building permits, within-city Census tract profiles; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Granite Falls?
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 6 public schools within the city match. 27.2% 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.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Granite Falls?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 3178.5 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 39% higher 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.
Is Granite Falls growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +18 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +0.4% 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.
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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Granite Falls?
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 North Carolina, the closest population matches are Creedmoor (4,957 residents, $77,799 income); Wadesboro (4,966 residents, $34,125 income); Long View (4,967 residents, $44,156 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Barling, AR (4,919 residents); Nashville, GA (4,918 residents); Rio Communities, NM (4,924 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.
Housing and income
How far does income reach against housing in Granite Falls?
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.
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 9.6%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
2.7×
Home value
$203,100
Household income
$74,250
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What does the journey to work look like in Granite Falls?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 83.0%. 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
83.0%
Work from home
10.0%
Public transit
0.0%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 2,054 workers age 16+.
Above median income · poverty 9.6% (Above-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
94.3 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, North Carolina average
C-
City profile score · Granite Falls, NC
52/100
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 B-
94.3 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Household income C-
$74,250
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share C-
27.2%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime D
204 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Poverty rate D
9.6%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Granite Falls profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 67/100 (B-) · 94.3 index
Household income: 54/100 (C-) · $74,250
Bachelor's+ share: 53/100 (C-) · 27.2%
Violent crime: 47/100 (D) · 204 /100k
Poverty rate: 41/100 (D) · 9.6%
Where Granite Falls sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Granite Falls'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 - Granite Falls highlighted among 27 peers.Read the chart values
Granite Falls, NC (this city): home $203,100, crime 3,179/100k
Barling, AR : home $125,200, crime 1,696/100k
Nashville, GA : home $97,000, crime 2,768/100k
Herculaneum, MO : home $222,100, crime 1,435/100k
Edwardsville, PA : home $114,200, crime 1,742/100k
Creedmoor, NC : home $260,000, crime 1,915/100k
Wadesboro, NC : home $98,600, crime 9,391/100k
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 Granite Falls compare to other US cities?
Granite Falls measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income55% higher than other cities
Home value44% pricier than other cities
Median rent48% pricier than other cities
Safety14% 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 North Carolina, Granite Falls ranks #117 of 195 North Carolina 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 Granite Falls against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to North Carolina only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
North Carolina-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Granite Falls near the bottom of North Carolina's cities
Among the 746 North Carolina cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Granite Falls ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Granite Falls only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#203 of 700
71st percentile in North Carolina
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 746
0th percentile in North Carolina
Median Home Value
#323 of 708
54th percentile in North Carolina
Poverty Rate
#366 of 746
51st percentile in North Carolina
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#264 of 746
64th percentile in North Carolina
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 North Carolina only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
55th percentile nationally for median household income · 14th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Granite Falls's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Granite Falls'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 Granite Falls's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$203,100Among the most affordablemore affordable than 56% 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
Granite Falls's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#5,232 of 15,516
More affordable than 66% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#4,567 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 2.7×, Granite Falls sits in the affordable band:
national rank #5,232 of 15,516 and #4,567 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
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
$74,250Granite Falls, NC median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Granite Falls, NC median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Granite Falls, NC.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)27.2%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)9.6%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)55.6%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
4,921
Median Income
$74,250
Median Home Value
$203,100
Median Age
42.4
Poverty Rate
9.6%
Labor force participation
55.6%
Bachelor's Degree+
27.2%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
3178.5
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
203.7
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2974.7
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
6
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Granite Falls's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
4,946 residents
2021
4,946 residents
2022
4,921 residents
2023
4,946 residents
2024
4,951 residents
2025
4,964 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
83.0%
Carpool
4.5%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
0.8%
Work from Home
10.0%
Other
1.7%
Based on 2,054 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
North Carolina statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $215
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across North Carolina at $215 (electricity about $115 , water and sewer about $45 ).
These are North Carolina statewide averages, not a meter reading for Granite Falls. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
North Carolina's BEA cost-of-living index is 94.3 (Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Granite Falls is $1,161/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to North Carolina statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 66.7 / 100 (Moderate).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a North Carolina statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Granite Falls sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Granite Falls compares to similar-size North Carolina 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 ACS B08301/B08136, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023, BEA Regional Price Parities 2024, HUD Fair Market Rents 2026, FEMA National Risk Index.