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Place dossier plate
SheetNC-HARRISBURG-NC · Harrisburg, NC 19,203 pop · income 93rd 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 Harrisburg
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Harrisburg on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Boone · lowest
28,633
Boone · lowest
28,633 median HH income
12.6% of the leader · rank #1
Longboat Key · near
143,365
Longboat Key · near
143,365 median HH income
62.8% of the leader · rank #2
Palmetto Bay · near
143,368
Palmetto Bay · near
143,368 median HH income
62.8% of the leader · rank #3
Harrisburg · this city
143,393
Harrisburg · this city
143,393 median HH income
62.9% of the leader · rank #4
Ocean Pointe · near
143,394
Ocean Pointe · near
143,394 median HH income
62.9% of the leader · rank #5
Westlake · near
143,424
Westlake · near
143,424 median HH income
62.9% of the leader · rank #6
Lake Forest · highest
228,120
Lake Forest · highest
228,120 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
Out-of-state nearest neighbors for Harrisburg on ACS population and median household income
. 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: 19,203.
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Harrisburg lands in the 93rd percentile for household income. Source: Census ACS.
93rd
percentile, household income
80th
percentile, home value
48th
percentile, median rent
📝 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: Harrisburg, NC
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 19,203 residents in Harrisburg, a small town within North Carolina. The typical household in Harrisburg brings in $143,393 a year, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 3.3%. Typical homes in Harrisburg are valued around $431,900, and the median resident age is 39.0 years. Educational attainment runs 55.7% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 67.8% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The city is served by 5 public schools according to NCES Common Core of Data.
Living costs in North Carolina run below the national norm: the state registers 94.3 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Below Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $1,161 per month statewide. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in North Carolina run around $215, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Workers in Harrisburg report an average commute of 23.6 minutes, with 69.5% driving alone and 21.5% working from home. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 66.7 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Harrisburg'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 comparison shortlist to work and mobility to population change to schools and households to housing and income; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Harrisburg, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, matched public-school count, annual population history.
No matched row is reported here for local building permits, FBI reported-crime rates, within-city Census tract profiles; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Comparison shortlist
Which cities make useful reference points for Harrisburg?
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.
Within North Carolina, the closest population matches are Lumberton (19,220 residents, $43,114 income); Mebane (18,899 residents, $84,312 income); Knightdale (19,532 residents, $91,638 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Alton, TX (19,205 residents); Durant, OK (19,209 residents); Lake Forest, IL (19,190 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.
What does the journey to work look like in Harrisburg?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 69.5%. The reported mean trip to work is 23.6 minutes.
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.
Is Harrisburg growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +1,805 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +9.5% 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.
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.
What does the education layer cover for Harrisburg?
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 5 public schools within the city match. 55.7% 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.
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 Harrisburg?
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 3.0 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 3.3%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
3.0×
Home value
$431,900
Household income
$143,393
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, North Carolina average
A-
City profile score · Harrisburg, NC
82/100
4 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.
Household income A+
$143,393
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share A
55.7%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate B+
3.3%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
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.
Violent crime N/A
N/A
No FBI UCR violent-crime rate for this place (coverage is incomplete).
Harrisburg profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Household income: 94/100 (A+) · $143,393
Bachelor's+ share: 89/100 (A) · 55.7%
Poverty rate: 76/100 (B+) · 3.3%
Cost of living: 67/100 (B-) · 94.3 index
How does Harrisburg compare to other US cities?
Here's how Harrisburg stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income93% higher than other cities
Home value80% pricier than other cities
Median rent48% pricier than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Harrisburg 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 Harrisburg near the bottom of North Carolina's cities
Among the 746 North Carolina cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Harrisburg ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Harrisburg only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#13 of 700
98th percentile in North Carolina
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 746
0th percentile in North Carolina
Median Home Value
#56 of 708
92nd percentile in North Carolina
Poverty Rate
#569 of 746
23rd percentile in North Carolina
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#59 of 746
92nd 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
93rd percentile nationally for median household income. Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
How Harrisburg's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$431,90020th percentilemore affordable than 20% 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
Harrisburg's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.0×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#6,754 of 15,516
More affordable than 56% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#923 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.0×, Harrisburg sits in the moderate band:
national rank #6,754 of 15,516 and #923 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
$143,393Harrisburg, NC median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Harrisburg, 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 Harrisburg, NC.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)55.7%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)3.3%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)67.8%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
19,203
Median Income
$143,393
Median Home Value
$431,900
Median Age
39.0
Poverty Rate
3.3%
Labor force participation
67.8%
Bachelor's Degree+
55.7%
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
Harrisburg's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
18,937 residents
2021
19,332 residents
2022
19,633 residents
2023
19,972 residents
2024
20,396 residents
2025
20,742 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
23.6 minutes
Drive Alone
69.5%
Carpool
5.3%
Public Transit
2.3%
Walk
0.6%
Work from Home
21.5%
Other
0.8%
Based on 9,678 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 Harrisburg. 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 Harrisburg 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 Harrisburg sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Harrisburg 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, 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.