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Place dossier plate
SheetWA-ABERDEEN-WA · Aberdeen, WA 17,040 pop · income 23rd pct · 21 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 Aberdeen
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Aberdeen on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
Bristol · lowest
44,706
Bristol · lowest
44,706 median HH income
37.9% of the leader · rank #1
Shelbina · near
52,176
Shelbina · near
52,176 median HH income
44.2% of the leader · rank #2
Aberdeen · this city
52,181
Aberdeen · this city
52,181 median HH income
44.2% of the leader · rank #3
Grayling · near
52,188
Grayling · near
52,188 median HH income
44.2% of the leader · rank #4
Traver · near
52,188
Traver · near
52,188 median HH income
44.2% of the leader · rank #5
Iron City · near
52,188
Iron City · near
52,188 median HH income
44.2% of the leader · rank #6
West Richland · highest
118,056
West Richland · highest
118,056 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 Aberdeen 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: 17,040.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Aberdeen - the verdict
Out of every US city with 1,000+ residents, Aberdeen places in the 23rd percentile for household income and the 12th percentile for safety. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
23rd
percentile, household income
50th
percentile, home value
70th
percentile, median rent
12th
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: Aberdeen, WA
17,040 people live in Aberdeen, Washington - a small town by U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Aberdeen report a median income of $52,181 per year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 16.7%. Home values in Aberdeen run a median of $225,100, and the median resident age is 36.9 years. Educational attainment runs 14.7% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 50.4% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
In 2024, 11 residential building permits were authorized in Aberdeen (Building Boom), up 450% from five years earlier, per Census BPS data. Aberdeen's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: per-100,000 total crime stands at 3345.1 in FBI UCR data, above the national average (a voluntary reporting program, read this as reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). NOAA climate normals record an annual average temperature of 51.4°F with 84.9 inches of precipitation per year and 0.5 inches of snowfall.
Washington carries a cost-of-living premium: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, Washington scores 107.0 (Above Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. A typical two-bedroom carries a HUD Fair Market Rent of $1,472 per month statewide. Monthly utility costs average around $188 across Washington, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. Workers in Aberdeen report an average commute of 20.5 minutes, with 76.6% driving alone and 6.5% working from home. Natural-hazard exposure scores 70.0 out of 100 on FEMA's National Risk Index (High).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Aberdeen'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 schools and households to comparison shortlist to housing and income to population change to within-city variation to reported crime to climate and hazard context; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Aberdeen, city-specific coverage includes FBI reported-crime rates, within-city Census tract profiles, local building permits, annual population history, matched public-school count, commute-mode shares.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
What does the journey to work look like in Aberdeen?
Driving alone is the largest reported mode at 76.6%. The reported mean trip to work is 20.5 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.
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 14 public schools within the city match. 14.7% 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 Aberdeen?
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 Washington, the closest population matches are West Richland (17,126 residents, $118,056 income); Washougal (16,945 residents, $100,916 income); Camano (17,535 residents, $100,124 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Safety Harbor, FL (17,040 residents); Fairview Park, OH (17,049 residents); Oswego, NY (17,028 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 21 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 Aberdeen?
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. Housing value is high relative to the citywide income median. That flags a question for comparison, not a verdict: tenure, household composition, financing costs, and the age of the ACS estimate can all change what a resident actually pays.
The home-value-to-income reference is comparatively stretched: the ACS median home value is 4.3 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 16.7%, which keeps the citywide median from describing every household.
Value / income
4.3×
Home value
$225,100
Household income
$52,181
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
Is Aberdeen growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +49 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +0.3% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 11 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
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.
2020 estimate
17,039
2025 estimate
17,088
Period change
+0.3%
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Aberdeen?
The joined FBI UCR record reports 3345.1 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 47% 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
3345.1
Violent rate
370.4
Property rate
2974.7
FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, incidents per 100,000. Voluntary agency reporting; not a danger score.
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.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 51.4°F, with 84.9 inches of precipitation and 0.5 inches of annual snowfall. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Washington is 70.0 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.
FEMA risk index (state avg)
70.0
Annual precipitation
84.9 in
Mean temperature
51.4°F
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
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.
Violent crime F
370 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Household income F
$52,181
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Poverty rate F
16.7%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Bachelor's+ share F
14.7%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Cost of living F
107.0 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Aberdeen profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Violent crime: 24/100 (F) · 370 /100k
Household income: 23/100 (F) · $52,181
Poverty rate: 19/100 (F) · 16.7%
Bachelor's+ share: 19/100 (F) · 14.7%
Cost of living: 15/100 (F) · 107.0 index
Where Aberdeen sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Aberdeen'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 - Aberdeen highlighted among 9 peers.Read the chart values
Aberdeen, WA (this city): home $225,100, crime 3,345/100k
Safety Harbor, FL : home $433,300, crime 821/100k
Huntington, IN : home $104,300, crime 395/100k
Norwalk, OH : home $156,000, crime 653/100k
Bristol, VA : home $168,700, crime 3,464/100k
West Richland, WA : home $404,300, crime 687/100k
Washougal, WA : home $492,100, crime 1,315/100k
Port Orchard, WA : home $492,000, crime 3,286/100k
Sunnyside, WA : home $207,200, crime 2,867/100k
How does Aberdeen compare to other US cities?
Where Aberdeen sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income23% higher than other cities
Home value50% pricier than other cities
Median rent70% pricier than other cities
Safety12% safer than other cities
"Safer than" reflects total crime rate from FBI UCR; the others use Census ACS estimates.
Zoom in to just Washington and the picture shifts: Aberdeen ranks #124 of 156 Washington cities by lowest crime rate, a different read than the national percentile above.
How we calculate these percentiles & ranks
Each percentile compares Aberdeen against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Washington only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Washington-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Aberdeen near the bottom of Washington's cities
Among the 599 Washington cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Aberdeen ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Aberdeen only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#503 of 565
11th percentile in Washington
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 599
0th percentile in Washington
Median Home Value
#473 of 565
16th percentile in Washington
Poverty Rate
#66 of 598
89th percentile in Washington
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#488 of 599
19th percentile in Washington
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 Washington only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
23rd percentile nationally for median household income · 12th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Aberdeen's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Aberdeen'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 Aberdeen's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$225,100Among the most affordablemore affordable than 50% 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
Aberdeen's home-value-to-income ratio: 4.3×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#11,560 of 15,516
More affordable than 25% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#2,236 of 3,317
Small cities (10,000–49,999)
At 4.3×, Aberdeen sits in the moderate band:
national rank #11,560 of 15,516 and #2,236 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
$52,181Aberdeen, WA median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Aberdeen, WA median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Aberdeen, WA.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)14.7%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)16.7%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)50.4%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
17,040
Median Income
$52,181
Median Home Value
$225,100
Median Age
36.9
Poverty Rate
16.7%
Labor force participation
50.4%
Bachelor's Degree+
14.7%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
3345.1
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
370.4
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2974.7
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
51.4°F
Annual Precipitation
84.9"
Annual Snowfall
0.5"
Schools
Total Schools
14
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Aberdeen's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
17,039 residents
2021
17,200 residents
2022
17,095 residents
2023
17,047 residents
2024
17,044 residents
2025
17,088 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📈 Building Boom
Total Permits (2024)
11
housing units authorized
Single-Family
11
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.6
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
2
2
0
$0.5M
2020
17
17
0
$2.5M
2021
10
8
2
$1.7M
2022
4
4
0
$1.4M
2023
9
9
0
$2.6M
2024
11
11
0
$3.7M
Permit volume increased 450% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Average Commute Time
20.5 minutes
Drive Alone
76.6%
Carpool
9.2%
Public Transit
2.2%
Walk
2.1%
Work from Home
6.5%
Other
3.4%
Based on 6,348 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Washington statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $188
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Washington at $188 (electricity about $85 , water and sewer about $55 ).
These are Washington statewide averages, not a meter reading for Aberdeen. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Washington's BEA cost-of-living index is 107.0 (Above Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Aberdeen is $1,472/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Washington statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 70.0 / 100 (High).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Washington statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Aberdeen sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Aberdeen compares to similar-size Washington 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.