Side-by-side metrics and state or size-class ranks use the same Census and FBI fields shown on this profile. Results stay in the URL so you can bookmark or share them.
Place dossier plate
SheetNC-HOLLY-RIDGE-NC · Holly Ridge, NC 4,532 pop · income 81st 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 Holly Ridge
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Holly Ridge on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Edenton · lowest
42,721
Edenton · lowest
42,721 median HH income
40.2% of the leader · rank #1
DeForest · near
106,223
DeForest · near
106,223 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #2
Holly Ridge · this city
106,230
Holly Ridge · this city
106,230 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #3
Lambertville · near
106,236
Lambertville · near
106,236 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #4
Rowley · highest
106,250
Rowley · highest
106,250 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #5
Maple Park · near
106,250
Maple Park · near
106,250 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #6
Hills and Dal… · near
106,250
Hills and Dal… · near
106,250 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 Holly Ridge 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: 4,532.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Holly Ridge - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Holly Ridge places in the 81st percentile for household income and the 69th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
81st
percentile, household income
64th
percentile, home value
48th
percentile, median rent
69th
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: Holly Ridge, NC
4,532 people live in Holly Ridge, North Carolina - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Holly Ridge households earn a median of $106,230 annually, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 0.0%. Typical homes in Holly Ridge are valued around $291,100, and the median resident age is 35.8 years. 49.4% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 62.5% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Housing supply pressure shows in Census Building Permit Survey data: 74 residential units were authorized in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 59% from five years earlier. Holly Ridge reports a comparatively low crime rate: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 887.2 total incidents per 100,000 residents here, below the national average (agency reporting is voluntary, so this measures 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. Natural-hazard exposure scores 66.7 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Holly Ridge'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 comparison shortlist to population change to work and mobility to housing and income to reported crime; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Holly Ridge, city-specific coverage includes annual population history, local building permits, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, 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
What does the education layer cover for Holly Ridge?
The NCES join finds 3 public schools within the city match. 49.4% 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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Holly Ridge?
Within North Carolina, the closest population matches are Royal Pines (4,528 residents, $105,956 income); Raeford (4,545 residents, $43,311 income); Ranlo (4,556 residents, $75,843 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Fremont, MI (4,532 residents); Mount Vernon, MO (4,532 residents); Diboll, TX (4,531 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.
Is Holly Ridge 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 +1,660 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +39.1% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 74 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
What does the journey to work look like in Holly Ridge?
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.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 72.6%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
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 Holly Ridge?
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 0.0%, 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
$106,230
Home value
$291,100
Value / income
2.7×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Holly Ridge?
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 887.2 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 61% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
832.9
Violent rate
54.3
Total reported rate
887.2
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, North Carolina average
A-
City profile score · Holly Ridge, NC
82/100
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.
Poverty rate A+
0.0%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share A-
49.4%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime A-
54 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income A-
$106,230
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
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.
Holly Ridge profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Poverty rate: 100/100 (A+) · 0.0%
Bachelor's+ share: 83/100 (A-) · 49.4%
Violent crime: 83/100 (A-) · 54 /100k
Household income: 80/100 (A-) · $106,230
Cost of living: 67/100 (B-) · 94.3 index
Where Holly Ridge sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Holly Ridge'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 - Holly Ridge highlighted among 11 peers.Read the chart values
Holly Ridge, NC (this city): home $291,100, crime 887/100k
Fremont, MI : home $169,500, crime 2,554/100k
Mount Vernon, MO : home $175,000, crime 1,829/100k
Diboll, TX : home $82,400, crime 1,134/100k
Evansdale, IA : home $138,200, crime 2,082/100k
Jim Thorpe, PA : home $177,400, crime 1,124/100k
Raeford, NC : home $177,900, crime 1,543/100k
Ranlo, NC : home $184,500, crime 1,082/100k
Farmville, NC : home $184,900, crime 3,475/100k
China Grove, NC : home $207,500, crime 1,258/100k
Edenton, NC : home $226,800, crime 2,291/100k
How does Holly Ridge compare to other US cities?
Where Holly Ridge sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income81% higher than other cities
Home value64% pricier than other cities
Median rent48% pricier than other cities
Safety69% 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 North Carolina alone, Holly Ridge ranks #16 of 195 North Carolina 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 Holly Ridge 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 Holly Ridge near the bottom of North Carolina's cities
Among the 746 North Carolina cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Holly Ridge ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Holly Ridge only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#63 of 700
91st percentile in North Carolina
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 746
0th percentile in North Carolina
Median Home Value
#173 of 708
76th percentile in North Carolina
Poverty Rate
#653 of 746
0th percentile in North Carolina
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#93 of 746
88th 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
81st percentile nationally for median household income · 69th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Holly Ridge's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Holly Ridge'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 Holly Ridge's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$291,10036th percentilemore affordable than 36% 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
Holly Ridge's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#5,253 of 15,516
More affordable than 66% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#4,585 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 2.7×, Holly Ridge sits in the affordable band:
national rank #5,253 of 15,516 and #4,585 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
$106,230Holly Ridge, NC median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Holly Ridge, 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 Holly Ridge, NC.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)49.4%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)0.0%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)62.5%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
4,532
Median Income
$106,230
Median Home Value
$291,100
Median Age
35.8
Poverty Rate
0.0%
Labor force participation
62.5%
Bachelor's Degree+
49.4%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
887.2
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
54.3
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
832.9
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.
Schools
Total Schools
3
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Holly Ridge's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
4,248 residents
2021
4,460 residents
2022
4,910 residents
2023
5,185 residents
2024
5,773 residents
2025
5,908 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
74
housing units authorized
Single-Family
74
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
16.3
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
180
180
0
$31.3M
2020
136
136
0
$26.3M
2021
258
258
0
$52.5M
2022
123
123
0
$38.4M
2023
337
97
240
$44.9M
2024
74
74
0
$24.7M
Permit volume decreased 59% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
72.6%
Carpool
0.0%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
0.3%
Work from Home
26.6%
Based on 2,807 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 Holly Ridge. 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 Holly Ridge 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 Holly Ridge sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Holly Ridge 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 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.