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
SheetNJ-PROSPECT-PARK-NJ · Prospect Park, NJ 6,286 pop · income 17th 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 Prospect Park
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Prospect Park on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Leisure · lowest
42,705
Leisure · lowest
42,705 median HH income
28.5% of the leader · rank #1
Chandler · near
48,607
Chandler · near
48,607 median HH income
32.5% of the leader · rank #2
Prospect Park · this city
48,615
Prospect Park · this city
48,615 median HH income
32.5% of the leader · rank #3
Ithaca · near
48,617
Ithaca · near
48,617 median HH income
32.5% of the leader · rank #4
London · near
48,618
London · near
48,618 median HH income
32.5% of the leader · rank #5
Fort Payne · near
48,623
Fort Payne · near
48,623 median HH income
32.5% of the leader · rank #6
Morris Plains · highest
149,623
Morris Plains · highest
149,623 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 Prospect Park 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: 6,286.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Prospect Park - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Prospect Park places in the 17th percentile for household income and the 49th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
17th
percentile, household income
77th
percentile, home value
94th
percentile, median rent
49th
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: Prospect Park, NJ
New Jersey's Prospect Park is a small town, with 6,286 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Prospect Park households earn a median of $48,615 annually, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 24.8%. Home values in Prospect Park run a median of $391,500, and the median resident age is 35.4 years. Educational attainment runs 24.5% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 58.7% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 0 residential units authorized here in 2024 (No Permits). Prospect Park reports a comparatively low crime rate: the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program logs 1394.6 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).
New Jersey carries a cost-of-living premium: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts New Jersey at 108.8 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Well Above Average). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $2,132 per month. Statewide, average monthly utility bills in New Jersey run around $275, per EIA 2023 residential energy data. Natural-hazard exposure scores 90.8 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Very High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Prospect Park'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 population change to comparison shortlist to work and mobility to reported crime to housing and income; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Prospect Park, city-specific coverage includes local building permits, FBI reported-crime rates, commute-mode shares, matched public-school count, 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.
Question 1
What does the education layer cover for Prospect Park?
The NCES join finds 1 public school within the city match. 24.5% 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 matched institution count is small, so district boundaries and schools outside the city line may matter more than the municipal count suggests. Use the number as a coverage cue, then verify attendance zones with the district before making a household decision.
Is Prospect Park 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 +83 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +1.3% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 0 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 Prospect Park?
Within New Jersey, the closest population matches are Yardville (6,266 residents, $100,776 income); Leisure (6,307 residents, $42,705 income); Kingston Estates (6,250 residents, $103,056 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are DeFuniak Springs, FL (6,284 residents); Shelburne, VT (6,292 residents); Yarmouth, ME (6,293 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.
What does the journey to work look like in Prospect Park?
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 74.9%. 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.
Reported crime
What can the FBI record say about safety in Prospect Park?
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 1394.6 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 39% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
1299.5
Violent rate
95.1
Total reported rate
1394.6
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
How far does income reach against housing in Prospect Park?
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 8.1 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 24.8%, 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
$48,615
Home value
$391,500
Value / income
8.1×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Low income · poverty 24.8% (Highest-decile poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
108.8 (US=100)
High cost · BEA RPP 2024, New Jersey average
F
City profile score · Prospect Park, NJ
29/100
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.
Violent crime B
95 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share D
24.5%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income F
$48,615
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.
Poverty rate F
24.8%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Prospect Park profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Violent crime: 72/100 (B) · 95 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 47/100 (D) · 24.5%
Household income: 18/100 (F) · $48,615
Cost of living: 10/100 (F) · 108.8 index
Poverty rate: 6/100 (F) · 24.8%
Where Prospect Park sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Prospect Park'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 - Prospect Park highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Prospect Park, NJ (this city): home $391,500, crime 1,395/100k
DeFuniak Springs, FL : home $163,200, crime 2,623/100k
Shelburne, VT : home $496,700, crime 1,389/100k
Yarmouth, ME : home $506,300, crime 509/100k
Obetz, OH : home $191,700, crime 1,207/100k
Countryside, IL : home $330,700, crime 2,606/100k
Carlstadt, NJ : home $523,800, crime 1,625/100k
Morris Plains, NJ : home $609,700, crime 1,187/100k
Paulsboro, NJ : home $169,400, crime 2,178/100k
How does Prospect Park compare to other US cities?
Prospect Park measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income17% higher than other cities
Home value77% pricier than other cities
Median rent94% pricier than other cities
Safety49% 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 New Jersey alone, Prospect Park ranks #155 of 238 New Jersey 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 Prospect Park 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 Prospect Park near the bottom of New Jersey's cities
Among the 686 New Jersey cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Prospect Park ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Prospect Park only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#638 of 659
3rd percentile in New Jersey
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 686
0th percentile in New Jersey
Median Home Value
#346 of 672
49th percentile in New Jersey
Poverty Rate
#20 of 680
97th percentile in New Jersey
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#542 of 686
21st 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
17th percentile nationally for median household income · 49th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Prospect Park's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Prospect Park'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 Prospect Park's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$391,50023rd percentilemore affordable than 23% 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
Prospect Park's home-value-to-income ratio: 8.1×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
pressured
> 5.0×
National rank
#15,058 of 15,516
More affordable than 3% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#11,054 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 8.1×, Prospect Park sits in the pressured band:
national rank #15,058 of 15,516 and #11,054 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
$48,615Prospect Park, NJ median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Prospect Park, 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 Prospect Park, NJ.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)24.5%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)24.8%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)58.7%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
6,286
Median Income
$48,615
Median Home Value
$391,500
Median Age
35.4
Poverty Rate
24.8%
Labor force participation
58.7%
Bachelor's Degree+
24.5%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1394.6
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
95.1
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1299.5
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
1
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Prospect Park's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
6,367 residents
2021
6,316 residents
2022
6,292 residents
2023
6,362 residents
2024
6,448 residents
2025
6,450 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
Total Permits (2024)
0
housing units authorized
Single-Family
0
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
0
0
0
-
2020
0
0
0
-
2021
0
0
0
-
2022
0
0
0
-
2023
0
0
0
-
2024
0
0
0
-
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
74.9%
Carpool
16.1%
Public Transit
0.9%
Walk
1.3%
Work from Home
2.9%
Other
3.9%
Based on 2,796 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 Prospect Park. 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 Prospect Park 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 Prospect Park sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Prospect Park 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, 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.