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Place dossier plate
SheetTX-PHARR-TX · Pharr, TX 79,809 pop · income 19th 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 Pharr
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Pharr on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Flat Rock · lowest
49,881
Flat Rock · lowest
49,881 median HH income
31.6% of the leader · rank #1
Farmington · near
49,882
Farmington · near
49,882 median HH income
31.6% of the leader · rank #2
Lyford · near
49,883
Lyford · near
49,883 median HH income
31.6% of the leader · rank #3
Pharr · this city
49,884
Pharr · this city
49,884 median HH income
31.6% of the leader · rank #4
Springerville · near
49,886
Springerville · near
49,886 median HH income
31.6% of the leader · rank #5
Clayton · near
49,886
Clayton · near
49,886 median HH income
31.6% of the leader · rank #6
Flower Mound · highest
157,737
Flower Mound · highest
157,737 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 Pharr 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: 79,809.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Pharr - the verdict
Pharr ranks in the 19th percentile for household income and the 50th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
19th
percentile, household income
14th
percentile, home value
40th
percentile, median rent
50th
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: Pharr, TX
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 79,809 residents in Pharr, a small city within Texas. Pharr households earn a median of $49,884 annually, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 27.8%. Typical homes in Pharr are valued around $111,500, and the median resident age is 29.5 years. Educational attainment runs 17.5% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 56.4% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 298 residential building permits were authorized in Pharr (Slowing), down 17% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Pharr reports a comparatively low crime rate: FBI UCR figures show 1358.5 crimes per 100,000 residents, below the national average (reporting is voluntary across agencies, so treat this as reporting activity rather than a definitive danger score).
Texas tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: the state registers 97.1 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Near Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in this state is $1,149 per month. Monthly utility costs average around $223 across Texas, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. Natural-hazard exposure scores 49.0 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Pharr'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 housing and income to comparison shortlist to schools and households to population change to reported crime to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Pharr, city-specific coverage includes FBI reported-crime rates, local building permits, 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
How far does income reach against housing in Pharr?
The home-value-to-income reference is relatively compact: the ACS median home value is 2.2 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 27.8%, 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. The ratio makes housing the clearest place to start this profile, but a low multiple can coexist with slow demand, older stock, or household-level hardship. Compare the home-value distribution and same-state peer table before treating it as an advantage.
Which cities make useful reference points for Pharr?
Within Texas, the closest population matches are Georgetown (78,803 residents, $91,857 income); Flower Mound (77,886 residents, $157,737 income); Cedar Park (77,474 residents, $123,972 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Plymouth, MN (79,526 residents); Kissimmee, FL (79,504 residents); Parma, OH (80,131 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.
The NCES join finds 35 public schools within the city match. 17.5% 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 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.
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 +994 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +1.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 298 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
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 Pharr?
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 1358.5 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 40% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
1136.4
Violent rate
222.1
Total reported rate
1358.5
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
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 77.8%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Public transit
0.2%
Work from home
6.2%
Drive alone
77.8%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 31,606 workers age 16+.
Low income · poverty 27.8% (Highest-decile poverty)
Cost of Living Index (state)
97.1 (US=100)
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Texas average
F
City profile score · Pharr, TX
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.
Cost of living C-
97.1 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 D
222 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share F
17.5%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Household income F
$49,884
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
27.8%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Pharr profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 53/100 (C-) · 97.1 index
Violent crime: 44/100 (D) · 222 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 27/100 (F) · 17.5%
Household income: 20/100 (F) · $49,884
Poverty rate: 3/100 (F) · 27.8%
Where Pharr sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Pharr'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 - Pharr highlighted among 13 peers.Read the chart values
Pharr, TX (this city): home $111,500, crime 1,359/100k
Plymouth, MN : home $474,700, crime 1,075/100k
Kissimmee, FL : home $273,900, crime 2,386/100k
Parma, OH : home $157,600, crime 830/100k
Perris, CA : home $431,900, crime 2,163/100k
South Jordan, UT : home $614,800, crime 982/100k
Lynchburg, VA : home $211,800, crime 2,095/100k
Georgetown, TX : home $398,600, crime 1,361/100k
Flower Mound, TX : home $514,100, crime 640/100k
Cedar Park, TX : home $474,800, crime 1,294/100k
Longview, TX : home $182,700, crime 2,690/100k
Mansfield, TX : home $380,000, crime 1,475/100k
Missouri City, TX : home $281,600, crime 1,191/100k
How does Pharr compare to other US cities?
Here's how Pharr stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income19% higher than other cities
Home value14% pricier than other cities
Median rent40% pricier than other cities
Safety50% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Texas and the picture shifts: Pharr ranks #311 of 624 Texas cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Pharr against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Texas only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Texas-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Pharr near the bottom of Texas's cities
Among the 1,663 Texas cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Pharr ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Pharr only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#1,143 of 1,520
25th percentile in Texas
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 1,663
0th percentile in Texas
Median Home Value
#1,043 of 1,505
31st percentile in Texas
Poverty Rate
#147 of 1,663
91st percentile in Texas
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#801 of 1,663
52nd percentile in Texas
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 Texas only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
19th percentile nationally for median household income · 50th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Pharr's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Pharr'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 Pharr's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$111,500Among the most affordablemore affordable than 86% 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
Pharr's home-value-to-income ratio: 2.2×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#2,636 of 15,516
More affordable than 83% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#10 of 750
Mid-size cities (50,000–199,999)
At 2.2×, Pharr sits in the affordable band:
national rank #2,636 of 15,516 and #10 of 750mid-size cities (50,000–199,999).
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
$49,884Pharr, TX median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Pharr, TX median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Pharr, TX.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)17.5%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)27.8%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)56.4%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
79,809
Median Income
$49,884
Median Home Value
$111,500
Median Age
29.5
Poverty Rate
27.8%
Labor force participation
56.4%
Bachelor's Degree+
17.5%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1358.5
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
222.1
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
1136.4
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
35
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Pharr's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
79,836 residents
2021
79,603 residents
2022
80,215 residents
2023
80,659 residents
2024
81,038 residents
2025
80,830 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
🏗️ Slowing
Total Permits (2024)
298
housing units authorized
Single-Family
107
detached homes
Multifamily
191
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
3.7
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
360
235
125
$72.3M
2020
118
110
8
$26.2M
2021
451
229
222
$77.4M
2022
275
147
128
$55.4M
2023
345
176
169
$71.1M
2024
298
107
191
$47.1M
Permit volume decreased 17% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
77.8%
Carpool
11.7%
Public Transit
0.2%
Walk
0.9%
Work from Home
6.2%
Other
3.2%
Based on 31,606 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Texas statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $223
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Texas at $223 (electricity about $130 , water and sewer about $48 ).
These are Texas statewide averages, not a meter reading for Pharr. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Texas's BEA cost-of-living index is 97.1 (Near Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Pharr is $1,149/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Texas statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 49.0 / 100 (Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Texas statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Pharr sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Pharr compares to similar-size Texas 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.