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Place dossier plate
SheetNC-MOUNT-AIRY-NC · Mount Airy, NC 10,631 pop · income 8th pct · 23 tracts
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 Mount Airy
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Mount Airy on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Ridgeville · lowest
39,868
Ridgeville · lowest
39,868 median HH income
23.7% of the leader · rank #1
Salamanca · near
39,871
Salamanca · near
39,871 median HH income
23.7% of the leader · rank #2
Mount Airy · this city
39,873
Mount Airy · this city
39,873 median HH income
23.7% of the leader · rank #3
Needles · near
39,876
Needles · near
39,876 median HH income
23.7% of the leader · rank #4
Jewell · near
39,878
Jewell · near
39,878 median HH income
23.7% of the leader · rank #5
Fair Oaks Ran… · highest
168,309
Fair Oaks Ran… · highest
168,309 median HH income
100.0% of the leader · rank #6
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 Mount Airy 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: 10,631.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Mount Airy - the verdict
Nationally, Mount Airy sits in the 8th percentile for household income and the 19th percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
8th
percentile, household income
36th
percentile, home value
48th
percentile, median rent
19th
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: Mount Airy, NC
Mount Airy is a small town in North Carolina, home to 10,631 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Mount Airy report a median income of $39,873 per year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 24.4%. Typical homes in Mount Airy are valued around $176,600, and the median resident age is 46.7 years. 24.3% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 48.9% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Mount Airy's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: FBI UCR figures show 2747.9 crimes per 100,000 residents, above the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score).
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. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts North Carolina's average monthly utility costs around $215 (state average). The average commute for Mount Airy workers runs 18.0 minutes, with 79.9% driving alone and 3.5% working from home. 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 Mount Airy'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 work and mobility to population change to comparison shortlist to housing and income to within-city variation to schools and households to reported crime; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Mount Airy, city-specific coverage includes FBI reported-crime rates, commute-mode shares, annual population history, matched public-school count, within-city Census tract profiles.
No matched row is reported here for local building permits; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
Question 1
What does the journey to work look like in Mount Airy?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 79.9%. The reported mean trip to work is 18.0 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. 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.
Is Mount Airy growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +18 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +0.2% 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 Mount Airy?
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 Winterville (10,624 residents, $82,783 income); Tarboro (10,705 residents, $49,386 income); Pineville (10,780 residents, $64,257 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Cottage Grove, OR (10,630 residents); Fair Oaks Ranch, TX (10,630 residents); Munhall, PA (10,633 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 can 23 Census tracts reveal inside Mount Airy?
PlainCities matches 23 Census tracts to this city.
That layer breaks the citywide income, rent, and home-value medians into smaller Census geographies, which can reveal differences that one municipal median necessarily hides. A tract is a statistical area, not a locally defined neighborhood or a promise about conditions on a particular block. Start with the city profile for the broad comparison, then use the tract layer to test whether the same housing and income pattern is consistent across the city. Large within-city spreads are a reason to avoid treating any citywide median as a universal resident experience.
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 Mount Airy?
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. Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median. That flags a question for comparison, not a verdict: tenure, household composition, financing costs, and the age of the ACS estimate can all change what a resident actually pays.
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 4.4 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 24.4%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
4.4×
Home value
$176,600
Household income
$39,873
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What does the education layer cover for Mount Airy?
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 11 public schools within the city match. 24.3% 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.
Poverty estimate
24.4%
Bachelor's degree+
24.3%
Matched public schools
11
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Mount Airy?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 2747.9 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 20% 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.
Total reported rate
2747.9
Violent rate
311.6
Property rate
2436.3
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Lowest-decile income · poverty 24.4% (Highest-decile poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
94.3 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, North Carolina average
F
City profile score · Mount Airy, NC
30/100
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.
Bachelor's+ share D
24.3%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime F
312 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income F
$39,873
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
24.4%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Mount Airy profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 67/100 (B-) · 94.3 index
Bachelor's+ share: 47/100 (D) · 24.3%
Violent crime: 31/100 (F) · 312 /100k
Household income: 7/100 (F) · $39,873
Poverty rate: 7/100 (F) · 24.4%
Where Mount Airy sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Mount Airy'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 - Mount Airy highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Mount Airy, NC (this city): home $176,600, crime 2,748/100k
Cottage Grove, OR : home $318,800, crime 2,230/100k
Fair Oaks Ranch, TX : home $612,700, crime 619/100k
Munhall, PA : home $118,900, crime 1,492/100k
Winterville, NC : home $226,600, crime 805/100k
Tarboro, NC : home $155,500, crime 3,361/100k
Pineville, NC : home $344,700, crime 9,479/100k
Waynesville, NC : home $254,800, crime 3,311/100k
Rolesville, NC : home $467,400, crime 471/100k
How does Mount Airy compare to other US cities?
Here's how Mount Airy stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income8% higher than other cities
Home value36% pricier than other cities
Median rent48% pricier than other cities
Safety19% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just North Carolina and the picture shifts: Mount Airy ranks #101 of 195 North Carolina cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Mount Airy 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 Mount Airy near the bottom of North Carolina's cities
Among the 746 North Carolina cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Mount Airy ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Mount Airy only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#579 of 700
17th percentile in North Carolina
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 746
0th percentile in North Carolina
Median Home Value
#407 of 708
43rd percentile in North Carolina
Poverty Rate
#106 of 746
86th percentile in North Carolina
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#313 of 746
58th 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
8th percentile nationally for median household income · 19th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Mount Airy's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Mount Airy'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 Mount Airy's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$176,600Among the most affordablemore affordable than 64% 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
Mount Airy's home-value-to-income ratio: 4.4×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#11,835 of 15,516
More affordable than 24% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#2,301 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 4.4×, Mount Airy sits in the moderate band:
national rank #11,835 of 15,516 and #2,301 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
$39,873Mount Airy, NC median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Mount Airy, 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 Mount Airy, NC.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)24.3%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)24.4%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)48.9%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
10,631
Median Income
$39,873
Median Home Value
$176,600
Median Age
46.7
Poverty Rate
24.4%
Labor force participation
48.9%
Bachelor's Degree+
24.3%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2747.9
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
311.6
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2436.3
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
11
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Mount Airy's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
10,664 residents
2021
10,624 residents
2022
10,640 residents
2023
10,621 residents
2024
10,676 residents
2025
10,682 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
18.0 minutes
Drive Alone
79.9%
Carpool
13.6%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
1.3%
Work from Home
3.5%
Other
1.7%
Based on 4,180 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 Mount Airy. 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 Mount Airy 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 Mount Airy sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Mount Airy 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.