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Place dossier plate
SheetSD-CHAMBERLAIN-SD · Chamberlain, SD 2,621 pop · income 56th pct · 2 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 Chamberlain
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Chamberlain on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Hoxie · lowest
35,234
Hoxie · lowest
35,234 median HH income
32.9% of the leader · rank #1
Chamberlain · this city
75,000
Chamberlain · this city
75,000 median HH income
70.0% of the leader · rank #2
Scranton · near
75,000
Scranton · near
75,000 median HH income
70.0% of the leader · rank #3
Auberry · near
75,000
Auberry · near
75,000 median HH income
70.0% of the leader · rank #4
University of… · near
75,000
University of… · near
75,000 median HH income
70.0% of the leader · rank #5
Southern Ute · near
75,000
Southern Ute · near
75,000 median HH income
70.0% of the leader · rank #6
Leith-Hatfield · highest
107,206
Leith-Hatfield · highest
107,206 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 Chamberlain 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: 2,621.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Chamberlain - the verdict
Nationally, Chamberlain sits in the 56th percentile for household income and the 32nd percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
56th
percentile, household income
41st
percentile, home value
13th
percentile, median rent
32nd
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: Chamberlain, SD
Chamberlain is a small town in South Dakota, home to 2,621 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Median household income here is $75,000 per year, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 4.1%. Home values in Chamberlain run a median of $195,300, and the median resident age is 39.5 years. Educational attainment runs 36.6% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 59.9% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 1 residential building permits were authorized in Chamberlain (Construction Slowdown), down 87% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Crime here tracks close to the national norm: per-100,000 total crime stands at 2002.4 in FBI UCR data, near the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). The annual average temperature per NOAA climate normals runs 46.8°F with 24.1 inches of precipitation per year and 43.3 inches of snowfall.
Living costs in South Dakota run below the national norm: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts South Dakota at 88.6 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Well Below Average). A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $990 per month statewide. EIA 2023 residential energy data puts South Dakota's average monthly utility costs around $200 (state average). Commute times here average 10.9 minutes, with 66.5% driving alone and 4.8% working from home, per Census ACS commuting data. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 26.8 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Very Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Chamberlain'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 within-city variation to climate and hazard context to reported crime to housing and income to work and mobility to population change to schools and households to comparison shortlist; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Chamberlain, city-specific coverage includes within-city Census tract profiles, matched public-school count, local building permits, commute-mode shares, annual population history, FBI reported-crime rates.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
1. Within-city variation
What can 2 Census tracts reveal inside Chamberlain?
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.
What physical conditions frame life in Chamberlain?
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 46.8°F, with 24.1 inches of precipitation and 43.3 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for South Dakota is 26.8 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.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Chamberlain?
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 2002.4 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 12% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Which cities make useful reference points for Chamberlain?
Within South Dakota, the closest population matches are Sisseton (2,593 residents, $44,477 income); Lennox (2,587 residents, $76,477 income); Fort Pierre (2,534 residents, $74,732 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Sylvania, GA (2,621 residents); Leith-Hatfield, PA (2,621 residents); Adamsville, TN (2,621 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.
Housing and income
How far does income reach against housing in Chamberlain?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 2.6 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 4.1%, 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.
Household income
$75,000
Home value
$195,300
Value / income
2.6×
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 Chamberlain?
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 66.5%. The reported mean trip to work is 10.9 minutes.
Public transit
0.0%
Work from home
4.8%
Drive alone
66.5%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 1,173 workers age 16+.
Is Chamberlain growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
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.
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -22 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -0.9% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 1 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
-0.9%
2025 estimate
2,453
2020 estimate
2,475
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
What does the education layer cover for Chamberlain?
The NCES join finds 3 public schools within the city match. 36.6% 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.
Matched public schools
3
Bachelor's degree+
36.6%
Poverty estimate
4.1%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
Above median income · poverty 4.1% (Below-median poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
88.6 (US=100)
Very affordable · BEA RPP 2024, South Dakota average
C+
City profile score · Chamberlain, SD
60/100
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 A+
88.6 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 B
4.1%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share B-
36.6%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income C-
$75,000
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Violent crime F
441 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Chamberlain profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 91/100 (A+) · 88.6 index
Poverty rate: 71/100 (B) · 4.1%
Bachelor's+ share: 69/100 (B-) · 36.6%
Household income: 54/100 (C-) · $75,000
Violent crime: 20/100 (F) · 441 /100k
Where Chamberlain sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Chamberlain'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 - Chamberlain highlighted among 8 peers.Read the chart values
Chamberlain, SD (this city): home $195,300, crime 2,002/100k
Sylvania, GA : home $113,800, crime 457/100k
Adamsville, TN : home $188,000, crime 2,017/100k
Eldora, IA : home $108,800, crime 2,764/100k
Reynoldsville, PA : home $89,000, crime 484/100k
Sisseton, SD : home $111,900, crime 916/100k
Lennox, SD : home $210,800, crime 199/100k
Beresford, SD : home $219,800, crime 1,299/100k
How does Chamberlain compare to other US cities?
Chamberlain measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income56% higher than other cities
Home value41% pricier than other cities
Median rent13% pricier than other cities
Safety32% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
National percentiles can mask local variation. Looking only at South Dakota, Chamberlain ranks #25 of 34 South Dakota cities by lowest crime rate - a narrower, more locally useful cut than the national comparison above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Chamberlain against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to South Dakota only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
South Dakota-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Chamberlain near the bottom of South Dakota's cities
Among the 303 South Dakota cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Chamberlain ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Chamberlain only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#73 of 285
74th percentile in South Dakota
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 303
0th percentile in South Dakota
Median Home Value
#67 of 263
75th percentile in South Dakota
Poverty Rate
#184 of 302
39th percentile in South Dakota
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#30 of 303
90th percentile in South Dakota
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 South Dakota only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
56th percentile nationally for median household income · 32nd percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Chamberlain's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Chamberlain'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 Chamberlain's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$195,300Among the most affordablemore affordable than 59% 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
Chamberlain's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.6×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#4,524 of 15,516
More affordable than 71% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#4,025 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 2.6×, Chamberlain sits in the affordable band:
national rank #4,524 of 15,516 and #4,025 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
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
$75,000Chamberlain, SD median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Chamberlain, SD median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Chamberlain, SD.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)36.6%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)4.1%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)59.9%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
2,621
Median Income
$75,000
Median Home Value
$195,300
Median Age
39.5
Poverty Rate
4.1%
Labor force participation
59.9%
Bachelor's Degree+
36.6%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
2002.4
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
440.5
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1561.9
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
46.8°F
Annual Precipitation
24.1"
Annual Snowfall
43.3"
Schools
Total Schools
3
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Chamberlain's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
2,475 residents
2021
2,468 residents
2022
2,499 residents
2023
2,491 residents
2024
2,470 residents
2025
2,453 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
1
housing units authorized
Single-Family
1
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.4
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
8
8
0
$1.2M
2020
2
2
0
$0.3M
2021
9
4
5
$0.8M
2022
9
4
5
$0.8M
2023
1
1
0
$0.3M
2024
1
1
0
$0.5M
Permit volume decreased 87% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
10.9 minutes
Drive Alone
66.5%
Carpool
20.5%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
2.0%
Work from Home
4.8%
Other
6.2%
Based on 1,173 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
South Dakota statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $200
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across South Dakota at $200 (electricity about $95 , water and sewer about $40 ).
These are South Dakota statewide averages, not a meter reading for Chamberlain. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
South Dakota's BEA cost-of-living index is 88.6 (Well Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Chamberlain is $990/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to South Dakota statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 26.8 / 100 (Very Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a South Dakota statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Chamberlain sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Chamberlain compares to similar-size South Dakota 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.