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Place dossier plate
SheetNC-HOPE-MILLS-NC · Hope Mills, NC 17,823 pop · income 36th 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 Hope Mills
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Hope Mills on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Guayama zona… · lowest
21,010
Guayama zona… · lowest
21,010 median HH income
20.0% of the leader · rank #1
Grand Haven · near
60,665
Grand Haven · near
60,665 median HH income
57.8% of the leader · rank #2
La Ward · near
60,667
La Ward · near
60,667 median HH income
57.8% of the leader · rank #3
Cornell · near
60,667
Cornell · near
60,667 median HH income
57.8% of the leader · rank #4
Strafford · near
60,670
Strafford · near
60,670 median HH income
57.8% of the leader · rank #5
Hope Mills · this city
60,671
Hope Mills · this city
60,671 median HH income
57.8% of the leader · rank #6
Pinehurst · highest
104,955
Pinehurst · highest
104,955 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 Hope Mills 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: 17,823.
Nationally, Hope Mills sits in the 36th percentile for household income among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS.
36th
percentile, household income
35th
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: Hope Mills, NC
North Carolina's Hope Mills is a small town, with 17,823 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Households in Hope Mills report a median income of $60,671 per year, below the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 13.6%. Home values in Hope Mills run a median of $176,300, and the median resident age is 33.3 years. Educational attainment runs 23.6% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 53.3% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 149 residential building permits were authorized in Hope Mills (Building Boom), up 1763% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data.
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. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,161 monthly. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in North Carolina run around $215, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Commute times here average 24.7 minutes, with 79.2% driving alone and 7.4% working from home, per Census ACS commuting data. 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 Hope Mills'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 work and mobility to housing and income to comparison shortlist to population change; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Hope Mills, city-specific coverage includes local building permits, matched public-school count, annual population history, commute-mode shares.
No matched row is reported here for FBI reported-crime rates, 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 Hope Mills?
The NCES join finds 10 public schools within the city match. 23.6% 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 Hope Mills?
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 79.2%. The reported mean trip to work is 24.7 minutes.
How far does income reach against housing in Hope Mills?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 2.9 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 13.6%, 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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Hope Mills?
Within North Carolina, the closest population matches are Mount Holly (17,928 residents, $75,928 income); Pinehurst (17,992 residents, $104,955 income); Morganton (17,541 residents, $49,434 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Blythe, CA (17,824 residents); Bay City, TX (17,816 residents); Guayama zona urbana, PR (17,815 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.
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 Hope Mills 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 +486 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +2.7% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 149 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
+2.7%
2025 estimate
18,324
2020 estimate
17,838
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
Below median income · poverty 13.6% (Above-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
94.3 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, North Carolina average
D
City profile score · Hope Mills, NC
43/100
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.
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.
Bachelor's+ share D
23.6%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income F
$60,671
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
13.6%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime N/A
N/A
No FBI UCR violent-crime rate for this place (coverage is incomplete).
Hope Mills profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 67/100 (B-) · 94.3 index
Bachelor's+ share: 45/100 (D) · 23.6%
Household income: 36/100 (F) · $60,671
Poverty rate: 25/100 (F) · 13.6%
How does Hope Mills compare to other US cities?
Here's how Hope Mills stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income36% higher than other cities
Home value35% 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 Hope Mills 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 Hope Mills near the bottom of North Carolina's cities
Among the 746 North Carolina cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Hope Mills ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Hope Mills only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#326 of 700
53rd percentile in North Carolina
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 746
0th percentile in North Carolina
Median Home Value
#408 of 708
42nd percentile in North Carolina
Poverty Rate
#276 of 746
62nd percentile in North Carolina
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#329 of 746
56th 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
36th percentile nationally for median household income. Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
How Hope Mills's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$176,300Among the most affordablemore affordable than 65% 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
Hope Mills's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.9×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#6,167 of 15,516
More affordable than 60% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#769 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 2.9×, Hope Mills sits in the affordable band:
national rank #6,167 of 15,516 and #769 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
$60,671Hope Mills, NC median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Hope Mills, 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 Hope Mills, NC.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)23.6%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)13.6%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)53.3%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
17,823
Median Income
$60,671
Median Home Value
$176,300
Median Age
33.3
Poverty Rate
13.6%
Labor force participation
53.3%
Bachelor's Degree+
23.6%
Schools
Total Schools
10
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Hope Mills's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
17,838 residents
2021
17,913 residents
2022
17,859 residents
2023
18,039 residents
2024
18,058 residents
2025
18,324 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📈 Building Boom
Total Permits (2024)
149
housing units authorized
Single-Family
77
detached homes
Multifamily
72
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
8.4
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
8
0
8
$1.4M
2020
35
29
6
$8.8M
2021
37
37
0
$10.8M
2022
99
99
0
$23.9M
2023
69
69
0
$17.6M
2024
149
77
72
$29.6M
Permit volume increased 1763% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
24.7 minutes
Drive Alone
79.2%
Carpool
12.5%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
0.4%
Work from Home
7.4%
Based on 7,480 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 Hope Mills. 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 Hope Mills 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 Hope Mills sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Hope Mills 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 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.