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Place dossier plate
SheetVT-BARRE-VT · Barre, VT 8,461 pop · income 25th pct · 20 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 Barre
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Barre on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Brattleboro · lowest
46,972
Brattleboro · lowest
46,972 median HH income
53.1% of the leader · rank #1
Oswego · near
53,286
Oswego · near
53,286 median HH income
60.2% of the leader · rank #2
Granger · near
53,287
Granger · near
53,287 median HH income
60.2% of the leader · rank #3
Barre · this city
53,288
Barre · this city
53,288 median HH income
60.2% of the leader · rank #4
Camden · near
53,289
Camden · near
53,289 median HH income
60.2% of the leader · rank #5
Owensboro · near
53,295
Owensboro · near
53,295 median HH income
60.2% of the leader · rank #6
Farmington · highest
88,541
Farmington · highest
88,541 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 Barre 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: 8,461.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Barre - the verdict
Nationally, Barre sits in the 25th percentile for household income and the 10th percentile for safety among US cities with a population of 1,000 or more. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
25th
percentile, household income
43rd
percentile, home value
73rd
percentile, median rent
10th
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: Barre, VT
Census ACS 2023 estimates count 8,461 residents in Barre, a small town within Vermont. The typical household in Barre brings in $53,288 a year, below the median for U.S. cities on this measure, with a poverty rate of 14.4%. Typical homes in Barre are valued around $200,100, and the median resident age is 40.9 years. 32.7% of adults here have a bachelor's degree or higher; 55.2% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
Housing supply pressure shows in Census Building Permit Survey data: 3 residential units were authorized in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 50% from five years earlier. Barre's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: FBI UCR reporting places total crime at 3577.4 incidents per 100,000 residents, above the national average (voluntary agency reporting, reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score).
Vermont tracks close to the national cost-of-living baseline: BEA Regional Price Parities 2024 puts Vermont at 98.0 on a 100-equals-national-average scale (Near Average). Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,487 monthly. Monthly utility costs average around $251 across Vermont, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. The average commute for Barre workers runs 18.0 minutes, with 71.7% driving alone and 12.0% working from home. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 36.4 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Very Low).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Barre'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 population change to schools and households to comparison shortlist to housing and income to reported crime to within-city variation to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Barre, city-specific coverage includes FBI reported-crime rates, local building permits, within-city Census tract profiles, annual population history, matched public-school count, commute-mode shares.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
Is Barre growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population declined by -255 residents from 2020 to 2025, a -3.0% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 3 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Recent estimates point downward. A falling count can reflect migration, household size, annexation boundaries, or estimation noise, so it is a prompt to inspect the full series rather than a claim about local economic health.
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 3 public schools within the city match. 32.7% 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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Barre?
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.
Within Vermont, the closest population matches are Winooski (8,198 residents, $77,020 income); Montpelier (8,038 residents, $79,175 income); Bennington (8,888 residents, $53,839 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Clinton, OK (8,461 residents); Black Mountain, NC (8,462 residents); River Road, OR (8,462 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.
PlainCities matches 20 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.
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 Barre?
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 3.8 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 14.4%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
3.8×
Home value
$200,100
Household income
$53,288
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Barre?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 3577.4 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 57% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
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.
Total reported rate
3577.4
Violent rate
646.1
Property rate
2931.3
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 71.7%. The reported mean trip to work is 18.0 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. 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.
Drive alone
71.7%
Work from home
12.0%
Public transit
1.9%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 3,998 workers age 16+.
Above-average cost · BEA RPP 2024, Vermont average
F
City profile score · Barre, VT
32/100
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.
Bachelor's+ share C+
32.7%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Cost of living D
98.0 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Household income F
$53,288
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
14.4%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Violent crime F
646 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Barre profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Bachelor's+ share: 63/100 (C+) · 32.7%
Cost of living: 48/100 (D) · 98.0 index
Household income: 25/100 (F) · $53,288
Poverty rate: 24/100 (F) · 14.4%
Violent crime: 8/100 (F) · 646 /100k
Where Barre sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Barre'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 - Barre highlighted among 11 peers.Read the chart values
Barre, VT (this city): home $200,100, crime 3,577/100k
Clinton, OK : home $112,500, crime 1,941/100k
Black Mountain, NC : home $351,700, crime 1,238/100k
Collinsville, OK : home $207,100, crime 840/100k
Farmington, AR : home $249,900, crime 594/100k
Winooski, VT : home $350,700, crime 2,944/100k
Montpelier, VT : home $349,200, crime 2,298/100k
Bennington, VT : home $185,100, crime 2,855/100k
Brattleboro, VT : home $239,500, crime 4,681/100k
Middlebury, VT : home $388,100, crime 1,472/100k
St. Albans, VT : home $245,600, crime 13,395/100k
How does Barre compare to other US cities?
Here's how Barre stacks up against the full field of US cities (population 1,000+), computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income25% higher than other cities
Home value43% pricier than other cities
Median rent73% pricier than other cities
Safety10% 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 Vermont, Barre ranks #24 of 30 Vermont 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 Barre against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Vermont only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Vermont-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Barre near the bottom of Vermont's cities
Among the 161 Vermont cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Barre ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Barre only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#116 of 149
22nd percentile in Vermont
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 161
0th percentile in Vermont
Median Home Value
#96 of 152
37th percentile in Vermont
Poverty Rate
#24 of 161
85th percentile in Vermont
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#87 of 161
46th percentile in Vermont
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 Vermont only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
25th percentile nationally for median household income · 10th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Barre's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Barre'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 Barre's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$200,100Among the most affordablemore affordable than 57% 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
Barre's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.8×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#9,894 of 15,516
More affordable than 36% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#7,842 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 3.8×, Barre sits in the moderate band:
national rank #9,894 of 15,516 and #7,842 of 11,323micro cities (under 10,000).
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
$53,288Barre, VT median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Barre, VT median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Barre, VT.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)32.7%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)14.4%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)55.2%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
8,461
Median Income
$53,288
Median Home Value
$200,100
Median Age
40.9
Poverty Rate
14.4%
Labor force participation
55.2%
Bachelor's Degree+
32.7%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
3577.4
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
646.1
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2931.3
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
3
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Barre's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
8,469 residents
2021
8,468 residents
2022
8,430 residents
2023
8,390 residents
2024
8,286 residents
2025
8,214 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
3
housing units authorized
Single-Family
3
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
6
6
0
$0.6M
2020
1
1
0
$0.3M
2021
0
0
0
-
2022
0
0
0
-
2023
0
0
0
-
2024
3
3
0
$0.7M
Permit volume decreased 50% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
18.0 minutes
Drive Alone
71.7%
Carpool
8.3%
Public Transit
1.9%
Walk
6.1%
Work from Home
12.0%
Based on 3,998 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Vermont statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $251
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Vermont at $251 (electricity about $105 , water and sewer about $48 ).
These are Vermont statewide averages, not a meter reading for Barre. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Vermont's BEA cost-of-living index is 98.0 (Near Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Barre is $1,487/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Vermont statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 36.4 / 100 (Very Low).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Vermont statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Barre sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Barre compares to similar-size Vermont 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.