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Place dossier plate
SheetVA-AMHERST-VA · Amherst, VA 2,124 pop · income 51st pct · 10 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 Amherst
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Amherst on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Patrick Sprin… · lowest
41,532
Patrick Sprin… · lowest
41,532 median HH income
35.9% of the leader · rank #1
Amherst · this city
71,313
Amherst · this city
71,313 median HH income
61.6% of the leader · rank #2
Parkston · near
71,313
Parkston · near
71,313 median HH income
61.6% of the leader · rank #3
Mosinee · near
71,314
Mosinee · near
71,314 median HH income
61.6% of the leader · rank #4
South Gate · near
71,315
South Gate · near
71,315 median HH income
61.6% of the leader · rank #5
Trumansburg · near
71,316
Trumansburg · near
71,316 median HH income
61.6% of the leader · rank #6
Penngrove · highest
115,826
Penngrove · highest
115,826 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 Amherst 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: 2,124.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Amherst - the verdict
Amherst ranks in the 51st percentile for household income and the 60th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
51st
percentile, household income
46th
percentile, home value
62nd
percentile, median rent
60th
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: Amherst, VA
Virginia's Amherst is a small town, with 2,124 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Amherst households earn a median of $71,313 annually, above the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 2.1%. Amherst's housing stock carries a median value of $213,300, and the median resident age is 44.6 years. About 23.9% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 54.2% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Amherst reports a comparatively low crime rate: per-100,000 total crime stands at 1088.0 in FBI UCR data, below the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Virginia tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: the state registers 101.1 on a 100-equals-national-average index (Near Average) per BEA Regional Price Parities 2024. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,369 monthly. Monthly utility costs average around $235 across Virginia, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. FEMA's National Risk Index rates natural-hazard exposure at 33.3 out of 100 (Very Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Amherst'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 comparison shortlist to work and mobility to population change to within-city variation to housing and income to schools and households to reported crime; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Amherst, city-specific coverage includes FBI reported-crime rates, within-city Census tract profiles, matched public-school count, commute-mode shares, annual population history.
No matched row is reported here for local building permits; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
Question 1
Which cities make useful reference points for Amherst?
Within Virginia, the closest population matches are Patrick Springs (2,094 residents, $41,532 income); New Market (2,159 residents, $47,967 income); Appomattox (2,085 residents, $47,795 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Clifton Springs, NY (2,124 residents); Shepherd, TX (2,124 residents); Danville, AR (2,123 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 Amherst?
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 74.0%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
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 +35 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +1.7% change. No comparable local building-permit series is available here, so population change should not be read as a housing-supply measure. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
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.
PlainCities matches 10 Census tracts to this city.
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 Amherst?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.0 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 2.1%, 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
$71,313
Home value
$213,300
Value / income
3.0×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
The NCES join finds 5 public schools within the city match. 23.9% 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
5
Bachelor's degree+
23.9%
Poverty estimate
2.1%
NCES Common Core of Data school locations plus Census ACS resident characteristics.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Amherst?
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 1088.0 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, below the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 52% lower in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
Property rate
898.8
Violent rate
189.2
Total reported rate
1088.0
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Virginia average
C-
City profile score · Amherst, VA
53/100
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.
Poverty rate A
2.1%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income C-
$71,313
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Violent crime D
189 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share D
23.9%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Cost of living F
101.1 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Amherst profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Poverty rate: 85/100 (A) · 2.1%
Household income: 51/100 (C-) · $71,313
Violent crime: 49/100 (D) · 189 /100k
Bachelor's+ share: 46/100 (D) · 23.9%
Cost of living: 35/100 (F) · 101.1 index
Where Amherst sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Amherst'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 - Amherst highlighted among 25 peers.Read the chart values
Amherst, VA (this city): home $213,300, crime 1,088/100k
Shepherd, TX : home $144,100, crime 556/100k
Danville, AR : home $117,400, crime 805/100k
Cherryvale, KS : home $53,300, crime 2,038/100k
New Market, VA : home $247,400, crime 770/100k
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 Amherst compare to other US cities?
Here's how Amherst stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income51% higher than other cities
Home value46% pricier than other cities
Median rent62% pricier than other cities
Safety60% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Virginia and the picture shifts: Amherst ranks #29 of 117 Virginia cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Amherst against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Virginia only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Virginia-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Amherst near the bottom of Virginia's cities
Among the 619 Virginia cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Amherst ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Amherst only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#283 of 558
49th percentile in Virginia
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 619
0th percentile in Virginia
Median Home Value
#343 of 567
40th percentile in Virginia
Poverty Rate
#426 of 616
30th percentile in Virginia
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#347 of 618
43rd percentile in Virginia
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 Virginia only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
51st percentile nationally for median household income · 60th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Amherst's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Amherst'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 Amherst's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$213,300Among the most affordablemore affordable than 54% 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
Amherst's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.0×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
affordable
< 3.0×
National rank
#6,636 of 15,516
More affordable than 57% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#5,626 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 3.0×, Amherst sits in the affordable band:
national rank #6,636 of 15,516 and #5,626 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
$71,313Amherst, VA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Amherst, VA median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Amherst, VA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)23.9%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)2.1%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)54.2%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
2,124
Median Income
$71,313
Median Home Value
$213,300
Median Age
44.6
Poverty Rate
2.1%
Labor force participation
54.2%
Bachelor's Degree+
23.9%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
1088.0
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
189.2
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
898.8
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
5
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Amherst's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
2,111 residents
2021
2,118 residents
2022
2,124 residents
2023
2,124 residents
2024
2,128 residents
2025
2,146 residents
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
74.0%
Carpool
11.8%
Public Transit
0.0%
Walk
2.1%
Work from Home
11.4%
Other
0.7%
Based on 981 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Virginia statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $235
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Virginia at $235 (electricity about $115 , water and sewer about $50 ).
These are Virginia statewide averages, not a meter reading for Amherst. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Virginia's BEA cost-of-living index is 101.1 (Near Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Amherst is $1,369/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Virginia statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 33.3 / 100 (Very Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Virginia statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Amherst sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Amherst compares to similar-size Virginia 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 ACS B08301/B08136, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023, BEA Regional Price Parities 2024, HUD Fair Market Rents 2026, FEMA National Risk Index.