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Place dossier plate
SheetNJ-SOMERSET-NJ · Somerset, NJ 23,851 pop · income 85th 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 Somerset
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Somerset on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Bayonet Point · lowest
42,157
Bayonet Point · lowest
42,157 median HH income
21.2% of the leader · rank #1
Rowlett · near
113,600
Rowlett · near
113,600 median HH income
57.1% of the leader · rank #2
Somerset · this city
113,603
Somerset · this city
113,603 median HH income
57.1% of the leader · rank #3
Omena · near
113,611
Omena · near
113,611 median HH income
57.1% of the leader · rank #4
Kayak Point · near
113,611
Kayak Point · near
113,611 median HH income
57.1% of the leader · rank #5
Suamico · near
113,614
Suamico · near
113,614 median HH income
57.1% of the leader · rank #6
Summit · highest
199,107
Summit · highest
199,107 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 Somerset 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: 23,851.
Measured against every US city with at least 1,000 residents, Somerset lands in the 85th percentile for household income. Source: Census ACS.
85th
percentile, household income
78th
percentile, home value
94th
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: Somerset, NJ
Somerset is a small city in New Jersey, home to 23,851 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Somerset report a median income of $113,603 per year, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 4.0%. Typical homes in Somerset are valued around $408,600, and the median resident age is 40.9 years. Educational attainment runs 58.6% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 68.2% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The city is served by 10 public schools according to NCES Common Core of Data.
New Jersey carries a cost-of-living premium: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, New Jersey scores 108.8 (Well Above Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $2,132 per month statewide. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts New Jersey's average monthly utility costs around $275 (state average). 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 Somerset'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 housing and income to comparison shortlist to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Somerset, city-specific coverage includes matched public-school count, commute-mode shares.
No matched row is reported here for annual population history, FBI reported-crime rates, local building permits, within-city Census tract profiles; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
1. Schools and households
What does the education layer cover for Somerset?
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 10 public schools within the city match. 58.6% 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.
How far does income reach against housing in Somerset?
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.
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.6 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 4.0%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Which cities make useful reference points for Somerset?
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.
Within New Jersey, the closest population matches are South Plainfield (24,231 residents, $126,063 income); Glassboro (23,375 residents, $80,388 income); North Plainfield (22,667 residents, $83,529 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Raymore, MO (23,849 residents); Arnold, MD (23,866 residents); Pickerington, OH (23,828 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 does the journey to work look like in Somerset?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 69.7%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
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.
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+
58.6%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income A-
$113,603
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate B
4.0%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
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.
Violent crime N/A
N/A
No FBI UCR violent-crime rate for this place (coverage is incomplete).
Somerset profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 91/100 (A+) · 58.6%
Household income: 83/100 (A-) · $113,603
Poverty rate: 72/100 (B) · 4.0%
Cost of living: 10/100 (F) · 108.8 index
How does Somerset compare to other US cities?
Here's how Somerset stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income85% higher than other cities
Home value78% pricier than other cities
Median rent94% 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 Somerset 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 Somerset near the bottom of New Jersey's cities
Among the 686 New Jersey cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Somerset ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Somerset only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#277 of 659
58th percentile in New Jersey
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 686
0th percentile in New Jersey
Median Home Value
#324 of 672
52nd percentile in New Jersey
Poverty Rate
#285 of 680
58th percentile in New Jersey
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#173 of 686
74th 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
85th percentile nationally for median household income. Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
How Somerset's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$408,60022nd percentilemore affordable than 22% 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
Somerset's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.6×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#9,350 of 15,516
More affordable than 40% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#1,582 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.6×, Somerset sits in the moderate band:
national rank #9,350 of 15,516 and #1,582 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
$113,603Somerset, NJ median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Somerset, 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 Somerset, NJ.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)58.6%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)4.0%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)68.2%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
23,851
Median Income
$113,603
Median Home Value
$408,600
Median Age
40.9
Poverty Rate
4.0%
Labor force participation
68.2%
Bachelor's Degree+
58.6%
Schools
Total Schools
10
Public schools in this city
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
69.7%
Carpool
5.4%
Public Transit
6.7%
Walk
0.6%
Work from Home
17.1%
Based on 13,331 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 Somerset. 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 Somerset 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 Somerset sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Somerset 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, 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.