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Place dossier plate
SheetNJ-CAPE-MAY-NJ · Cape May, NJ 2,789 pop · income 31st 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 Cape May
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Cape May on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Madison · lowest
44,181
Madison · lowest
44,181 median HH income
24.2% of the leader · rank #1
Cape May · this city
57,230
Cape May · this city
57,230 median HH income
31.4% of the leader · rank #2
Mims · near
57,232
Mims · near
57,232 median HH income
31.4% of the leader · rank #3
Afton · near
57,232
Afton · near
57,232 median HH income
31.4% of the leader · rank #4
Clarkfield · near
57,232
Clarkfield · near
57,232 median HH income
31.4% of the leader · rank #5
Warrensburg · near
57,232
Warrensburg · near
57,232 median HH income
31.4% of the leader · rank #6
Hewitt · highest
182,516
Hewitt · highest
182,516 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 Cape May 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: 2,789.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Cape May - the verdict
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Cape May lands in the 31st percentile for household income and the 18th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
31st
percentile, household income
95th
percentile, home value
94th
percentile, median rent
18th
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: Cape May, NJ
Cape May is a small town in New Jersey, home to 2,789 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Cape May households earn a median of $57,230 annually, below the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 2.9%. Cape May's housing stock carries a median value of $823,800, and the median resident age is 54.4 years. 50.0% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 43.8% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Housing supply pressure shows in Census Building Permit Survey data: 24 residential units were authorized in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 40% from five years earlier. Cape May's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: FBI UCR figures show 2794.9 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). NOAA climate normals record an annual average temperature of 56.2°F with 43.8 inches of precipitation per year and 14.8 inches of snowfall.
New Jersey carries a cost-of-living premium: the state registers 108.8 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Well Above Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $2,132 monthly. Monthly utility costs average around $275 across New Jersey, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 90.8 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Very High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Cape May'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 reported crime to climate and hazard context to population change to schools and households to housing and income to work and mobility to comparison shortlist; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Cape May, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, FBI reported-crime rates, matched public-school count, local building permits, annual population history.
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.
1. Reported crime
What can the FBI record say about safety in Cape May?
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 2794.9 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 23% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 56.2°F, with 43.8 inches of precipitation and 14.8 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for New Jersey is 90.8 out of 100. Climate normals describe long-run weather; the FEMA score on PlainCities is a state average of county NRI inputs and combines hazards, exposure, vulnerability, and resilience.
The two sources should not be blended into one comfort or safety score. Use the climate values for baseline conditions and the risk index as a prompt to inspect specific hazards, insurance, and local emergency guidance for a particular address.
Is Cape May growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Recent estimates point downward. A falling count can reflect migration, household size, annexation boundaries, or estimation noise, so it is a prompt to inspect the full series rather than a claim about local economic health.
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -42 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -1.5% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 24 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Which cities make useful reference points for Cape May?
Within New Jersey, the closest population matches are Keasbey (2,793 residents, $65,948 income); Clinton (2,784 residents, $142,563 income); Spring Lake (2,782 residents, $146,976 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Madison, IL (2,788 residents); Manchester, PA (2,788 residents); Follansbee, WV (2,790 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.
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.
Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Cape May?
The NCES join finds 6 public schools within the city match. 50.0% 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.
Matched public schools
6
Bachelor's degree+
50.0%
Poverty estimate
2.9%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
How far does income reach against housing in Cape May?
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 14.4 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 2.9%, 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. 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.
Household income
$57,230
Home value
$823,800
Value / income
14.4×
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 Cape May?
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 72.3%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Public transit
0.1%
Work from home
8.4%
Drive alone
72.3%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 1,373 workers age 16+.
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.
Bachelor's+ share A-
50.0%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate B+
2.9%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime C+
145 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income F
$57,230
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Cost of living F
108.8 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Cape May profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 84/100 (A-) · 50.0%
Poverty rate: 79/100 (B+) · 2.9%
Violent crime: 60/100 (C+) · 145 /100k
Household income: 30/100 (F) · $57,230
Cost of living: 10/100 (F) · 108.8 index
Where Cape May sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Cape May'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 - Cape May highlighted among 26 peers.Read the chart values
Cape May, NJ (this city): home $823,800, crime 2,795/100k
Follansbee, WV : home $137,100, crime 605/100k
Postville, IA : home $100,300, crime 880/100k
Clinton, NJ : home $407,800, crime 359/100k
Spring Lake, NJ : home $2,000,000+, crime 1,168/100k
Pennington, NJ : home $608,200, crime 583/100k
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 Cape May compare to other US cities?
Cape May measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income31% higher than other cities
Home value95% pricier than other cities
Median rent94% pricier than other cities
Safety18% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just New Jersey and the picture shifts: Cape May ranks #213 of 238 New Jersey cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Cape May against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to New Jersey only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
New Jersey-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Cape May near the bottom of New Jersey's cities
Among the 686 New Jersey cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Cape May ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Cape May only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#615 of 659
7th percentile in New Jersey
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 686
0th percentile in New Jersey
Median Home Value
#62 of 672
91st percentile in New Jersey
Poverty Rate
#355 of 680
47th percentile in New Jersey
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#262 of 686
62nd percentile in New Jersey
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 New Jersey only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
31st percentile nationally for median household income · 18th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Cape May's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Cape May'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 Cape May's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$823,8005th percentilemore affordable than 5% 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
Cape May's home-value-to-income ratio: 14.4×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#15,487 of 15,516
More affordable than 0% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#11,302 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 14.4×, Cape May sits in the pressured band:
national rank #15,487 of 15,516 and #11,302 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median, a comparison flag, not a verdict on any household.
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
$57,230Cape May, NJ median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Cape May, NJ median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Cape May, NJ.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)50.0%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)2.9%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)43.8%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
2,789
Median Income
$57,230
Median Home Value
$823,800
Median Age
54.4
Poverty Rate
2.9%
Labor force participation
43.8%
Bachelor's Degree+
50.0%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2794.9
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
145.2
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2649.7
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.
Climate
Avg Temperature
56.2°F
Annual Precipitation
43.8"
Annual Snowfall
14.8"
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
Cape May's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
2,758 residents
2021
2,772 residents
2022
2,771 residents
2023
2,755 residents
2024
2,735 residents
2025
2,716 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
24
housing units authorized
Single-Family
24
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
8.6
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
40
28
12
$10.3M
2020
51
30
21
$14.8M
2021
35
35
0
$7.4M
2022
36
36
0
$9.8M
2023
25
25
0
$9.0M
2024
24
24
0
$11.0M
Permit volume decreased 40% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
72.3%
Carpool
3.7%
Public Transit
0.1%
Walk
9.0%
Work from Home
8.4%
Other
6.5%
Based on 1,373 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
New Jersey statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $275
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across New Jersey at $275 (electricity about $120 , water and sewer about $60 ).
These are New Jersey statewide averages, not a meter reading for Cape May. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
New Jersey's BEA cost-of-living index is 108.8 (Well Above Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Cape May is $2,132/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to New Jersey statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 90.8 / 100 (Very High).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a New Jersey statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Cape May sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Cape May compares to similar-size New Jersey 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, NOAA Climate Normals, 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.