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Place dossier plate
SheetVA-LAKE-RIDGE-VA · Lake Ridge, VA 45,007 pop · income 87th pct · 274 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 Lake Ridge
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Lake Ridge on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Blacksburg · lowest
48,070
Blacksburg · lowest
48,070 median HH income
26.8% of the leader · rank #1
Pinole · near
120,833
Pinole · near
120,833 median HH income
67.5% of the leader · rank #2
Alleman · near
120,833
Alleman · near
120,833 median HH income
67.5% of the leader · rank #3
North Star · near
120,833
North Star · near
120,833 median HH income
67.5% of the leader · rank #4
Lake Ridge · this city
120,844
Lake Ridge · this city
120,844 median HH income
67.5% of the leader · rank #5
Blowing Rock · near
120,865
Blowing Rock · near
120,865 median HH income
67.5% of the leader · rank #6
Burke · highest
179,063
Burke · highest
179,063 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 Lake Ridge 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: 45,007.
Lake Ridge ranks in the 87th percentile for household income nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS.
87th
percentile, household income
82nd
percentile, home value
62nd
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: Lake Ridge, VA
Virginia's Lake Ridge is a small city, with 45,007 residents per the latest Census Bureau ACS figures. Median household income here is $120,844 per year, placing it in the top quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 4.4%. Home values in Lake Ridge run a median of $452,800, and the median resident age is 37.4 years. About 50.5% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, while 65.7% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
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. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $1,369 per month statewide. Monthly utility costs average around $235 across Virginia, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. Workers in Lake Ridge report an average commute of 31.6 minutes, with 66.7% driving alone and 17.9% working from home. Natural-hazard exposure scores 33.3 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (Very Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Lake Ridge'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 work and mobility to comparison shortlist to within-city variation to housing and income; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Lake Ridge, city-specific coverage includes commute-mode shares, within-city Census tract profiles.
No matched row is reported here for FBI reported-crime rates, annual population history, matched public-school count, local building permits; the page leaves those layers out instead of substituting a statewide or national value.
Question 1
What does the journey to work look like in Lake Ridge?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 66.7%. The reported mean trip to work is 31.6 minutes.
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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Lake Ridge?
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 Virginia, the closest population matches are Blacksburg (45,288 residents, $48,070 income); Ashburn (45,551 residents, $152,094 income); Charlottesville (45,863 residents, $69,829 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Shakopee, MN (45,002 residents); Palm Springs, CA (44,998 residents); Clermont, FL (44,984 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 can 274 Census tracts reveal inside Lake Ridge?
PlainCities matches 274 Census tracts to this city.
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.
How far does income reach against housing in Lake Ridge?
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 3.7 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 4.4%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Virginia average
B-
City profile score · Lake Ridge, VA
69/100
4 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.
Household income A
$120,844
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Bachelor's+ share A-
50.5%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Poverty rate B-
4.4%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
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.
Violent crime N/A
N/A
No FBI UCR violent-crime rate for this place (coverage is incomplete).
Lake Ridge profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Household income: 86/100 (A) · $120,844
Bachelor's+ share: 84/100 (A-) · 50.5%
Poverty rate: 69/100 (B-) · 4.4%
Cost of living: 35/100 (F) · 101.1 index
How does Lake Ridge compare to other US cities?
Lake Ridge measured against every US city with 1,000+ residents, computed live from the same Census and FBI data shown throughout this page.
Household income87% higher than other cities
Home value82% pricier than other cities
Median rent62% 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 Lake Ridge 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 Lake Ridge near the bottom of Virginia's cities
Among the 619 Virginia cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Lake Ridge ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Lake Ridge only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#121 of 558
78th percentile in Virginia
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 619
0th percentile in Virginia
Median Home Value
#138 of 567
76th percentile in Virginia
Poverty Rate
#339 of 616
45th percentile in Virginia
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#139 of 618
77th 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
87th percentile nationally for median household income. Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
How Lake Ridge's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$452,80018th percentilemore affordable than 18% 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
Lake Ridge's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.7×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#9,863 of 15,516
More affordable than 36% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#1,736 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 3.7×, Lake Ridge sits in the moderate band:
national rank #9,863 of 15,516 and #1,736 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
$120,844Lake Ridge, VA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Lake Ridge, 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 Lake Ridge, VA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)50.5%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)4.4%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)65.7%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
45,007
Median Income
$120,844
Median Home Value
$452,800
Median Age
37.4
Poverty Rate
4.4%
Labor force participation
65.7%
Bachelor's Degree+
50.5%
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
31.6 minutes
Drive Alone
66.7%
Carpool
10.4%
Public Transit
3.4%
Walk
0.4%
Work from Home
17.9%
Other
1.2%
Based on 23,531 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 Lake Ridge. 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 Lake Ridge 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 Lake Ridge sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Lake Ridge 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, 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.