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Place dossier plate
SheetWI-ASHLAND-WI · Ashland, WI 7,884 pop · income 18th pct · 8 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 Ashland
Lowest/highest poles plus peers nearest Ashland on median household income. Full ladder: /browse and /rankings.
median HH income
South Boston · lowest
41,102
South Boston · lowest
41,102 median HH income
20.5% of the leader · rank #1
Eclectic · near
49,250
Eclectic · near
49,250 median HH income
24.6% of the leader · rank #2
Lexington · near
49,253
Lexington · near
49,253 median HH income
24.6% of the leader · rank #3
Lakewood · near
49,255
Lakewood · near
49,255 median HH income
24.6% of the leader · rank #4
Warrensville… · near
49,256
Warrensville… · near
49,256 median HH income
24.6% of the leader · rank #5
Ashland · this city
49,258
Ashland · this city
49,258 median HH income
24.6% of the leader · rank #6
Basking Ridge · highest
200,378
Basking Ridge · highest
200,378 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 Ashland 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: 7,884.
Agency-reported UCR totals per 100,000 population, not a neighborhood safety grade or a prediction of personal risk.
Ashland - the verdict
Ashland ranks in the 18th percentile for household income and the 14th percentile for safety nationally, out of every US city with at least 1,000 residents. Source: Census ACS + FBI UCR.
18th
percentile, household income
31st
percentile, home value
29th
percentile, median rent
14th
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: Ashland, WI
Ashland is a small town in Wisconsin, home to 7,884 residents per U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023 estimates. Households in Ashland report a median income of $49,258 per year, in the lower quartile of U.S. cities for household income, with a poverty rate of 11.9%. Home values in Ashland run a median of $162,200, and the median resident age is 40.2 years. Educational attainment runs 25.9% of adults with a bachelor's degree or higher. Separately, 59.5% of working-age residents are in the labor force.
The Census Building Permit Survey recorded 1 residential units authorized here in 2024 (Construction Slowdown), down 67% from five years earlier. Ashland's reported crime rate runs above the national norm: FBI UCR reporting places total crime at 3125.8 incidents per 100,000 residents, above the national average (voluntary agency reporting, reflects reporting activity, not a definitive danger score). The annual average temperature per NOAA climate normals runs 41.3°F with 32.8 inches of precipitation per year.
Living costs in Wisconsin run below the national norm: on BEA's 100-equals-national-average cost index, Wisconsin scores 94.1 (Below Average), per the 2024 Regional Price Parities release. Statewide, HUD pegs Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom unit at $1,097 monthly. Monthly utility costs average around $225 across Wisconsin, per EIA 2023 residential energy estimates. On FEMA's National Risk Index, this area rates 59.1 out of 100 for natural-hazard exposure (Moderate).
A decision-led reading path
Useful questions to ask of Ashland'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 schools and households to reported crime to population change to climate and hazard context to within-city variation to housing and income to comparison shortlist to work and mobility; another city can have a different sequence or fewer supported layers because the source joins are not uniform.
For Ashland, city-specific coverage includes matched public-school count, local building permits, annual population history, FBI reported-crime rates, commute-mode shares, within-city Census tract profiles.
All six city-specific enrichment layers used by this profile are present.
Question 1
What does the education layer cover for Ashland?
The NCES join finds 4 public schools within the city match. 25.9% 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.
What can the FBI record say about safety in Ashland?
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 3125.8 violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents, above the 2280.5 national reference used here. The difference is 37% higher in arithmetic terms, but agency participation is voluntary and reporting completeness varies.
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.
Which cities make useful reference points for Ashland?
Within Wisconsin, the closest population matches are Jackson (7,882 residents, $95,960 income); Cottage Grove (7,906 residents, $132,717 income); Ripon (7,803 residents, $59,063 income). Outside the state, the closest population matches in this dataset are Dalhart, TX (7,885 residents); Basking Ridge, NJ (7,882 residents); Farr West, UT (7,881 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.
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.
Population change
Is Ashland growing, shrinking, or holding steady?
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.
Census PEP estimates show the population grew by +19 residents from 2020 to 2025, a +0.2% change. Separately, Census BPS recorded 1 housing units authorized in 2024. PEP and ACS are different Census series, so the trend is kept separate from the headline ACS population.
Period change
+0.2%
2025 estimate
7,927
2020 estimate
7,908
Census Population Estimates Program, 2020–2025; permit context uses Census BPS.
NOAA normals put the annual mean temperature at 41.3°F, with 32.8 inches of precipitation. FEMA's state-averaged National Risk Index score for Wisconsin is 59.1 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.
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.
Mean temperature
41.3°F
Annual precipitation
32.8 in
FEMA risk index (state avg)
59.1
NOAA Climate Normals and FEMA National Risk Index (state-averaged on PlainCities). Hazard context is not address-level.
How far does income reach against housing in Ashland?
The home-value-to-income reference sits in a middle range: the ACS median home value is 3.3 times median household income. The ACS poverty estimate is 11.9%, 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
$49,258
Home value
$162,200
Value / income
3.3×
City-level Census ACS 2023 medians. The ratio divides two separate medians and is descriptive only.
What does the journey to work look like in Ashland?
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 72.6%. A reliable mean commute time is not available for this row, so the mode shares carry the comparison.
Public transit
1.3%
Work from home
8.1%
Drive alone
72.6%
City-level Census ACS commuting estimates covering 3,830 workers age 16+.
Near national cost · BEA RPP 2024, Wisconsin average
D
City profile score · Ashland, WI
43/100
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 B-
94.1 index
BEA state Regional Price Parities index (100 ≈ national average); lower is stronger on this axis. Same value for every city in the state.
Bachelor's+ share C-
25.9%
Adults with a bachelor's degree or higher; ACS.
Violent crime C-
178 /100k
FBI UCR violent offenses per 100,000 residents; lower is stronger on this axis.
Poverty rate F
11.9%
Share of residents below the poverty line; lower scores better on this axis.
Household income F
$49,258
Median household income vs U.S. cities (pop ≥1,000); ACS.
Ashland profile (scored ACS/FBI dimensions)Read the chart values
Cost of living: 68/100 (B-) · 94.1 index
Bachelor's+ share: 51/100 (C-) · 25.9%
Violent crime: 51/100 (C-) · 178 /100k
Poverty rate: 32/100 (F) · 11.9%
Household income: 19/100 (F) · $49,258
Where Ashland sits on home value vs crime among peer cities
Ashland'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 - Ashland highlighted among 8 peers.Read the chart values
Ashland, WI (this city): home $162,200, crime 3,126/100k
Dalhart, TX : home $155,300, crime 997/100k
South Boston, VA : home $157,300, crime 2,978/100k
Cottage Grove, WI : home $401,900, crime 567/100k
Ripon, WI : home $161,500, crime 827/100k
Jefferson, WI : home $222,100, crime 1,620/100k
Mount Horeb, WI : home $359,500, crime 284/100k
Antigo, WI : home $94,700, crime 1,436/100k
How does Ashland compare to other US cities?
Where Ashland sits among all US cities (population 1,000+) on each measure, computed live from Census and FBI data.
Household income18% higher than other cities
Home value31% pricier than other cities
Median rent29% pricier than other cities
Safety14% 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 Wisconsin, Ashland ranks #195 of 202 Wisconsin 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 Ashland against every qualifying US city; each in-state rank narrows that to Wisconsin only. Full formula and direction notes: methodology.
Wisconsin-relative analysis
Median Gross Rent places Ashland near the bottom of Wisconsin's cities
Among the 761 Wisconsin cities PlainCities tracks with reported median gross rent data, Ashland ranks #1 - the 0th percentile within the state. This is a different, narrower cut than the nationwide percentiles above: it compares Ashland only against its own state's cities, not the full US field.
Median Household Income
#667 of 753
11th percentile in Wisconsin
Median Gross Rent
#1 of 761
0th percentile in Wisconsin
Median Home Value
#453 of 754
40th percentile in Wisconsin
Poverty Rate
#126 of 761
83rd percentile in Wisconsin
Bachelor's Degree or Higher
#289 of 761
62nd percentile in Wisconsin
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 Wisconsin only, not a livability score. See the methodology for the source and calculation.
Gauge source note
18th percentile nationally for median household income · 14th percentile for safety (lower crime rate). Source: Census ACS 2023 / FBI UCR 2023.
Ashland's profile vs. every US city
Income, affordability, and safety percentile
Ashland'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 Ashland's home value compares nationally
Median home value vs. every US city (population 1,000+)
$162,200Among the most affordablemore affordable than 69% 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
Ashland's home-value-to-income ratio: 3.3×
ACS median home value divided by median household income.
Band
moderate
3.0–5.0×
National rank
#8,094 of 15,516
More affordable than 48% of tracked cities (pop. 1,000+)
Size class
#6,629 of 11,323
Micro cities (under 10,000)
At 3.3×, Ashland sits in the moderate band:
national rank #8,094 of 15,516 and #6,629 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
$49,258Ashland, WI median household income (Census ACS)
Show U.S. national quintile / Lorenz context Ashland, WI median household income (Census ACS 5-year) with U.S. national quintile shares for context. Diagonal = equality; the curve is national, not computed for Ashland, WI.
Key socioeconomic indicators
Bachelor's degree or higher (adults 25+)25.9%
Census ACS S1501, educational attainment
Poverty rate (households below FPL)11.9%
Census ACS S1701, poverty status
Labor force participation (adults 16+)59.5%
Census ACS S2301, share of working-age residents in the labor force
Population
7,884
Median Income
$49,258
Median Home Value
$162,200
Median Age
40.2
Poverty Rate
11.9%
Labor force participation
59.5%
Bachelor's Degree+
25.9%
Safety & Crime
Total Crime Rate
3125.8
per 100,000 residents
Violent Crime
177.9
per 100,000 residents
Property Crime
2947.9
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
41.3°F
Annual Precipitation
32.8"
Annual Snowfall
N/A
Schools
Total Schools
4
Public schools in this city
Population Change
PEP vintage
Annual U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program (PEP) estimates, 2020–2025
Ashland's Census PEP population estimates, 2020–2025.Read the chart as text
Period
Population
2020
7,908 residents
2021
7,881 residents
2022
7,881 residents
2023
7,934 residents
2024
7,943 residents
2025
7,927 residents
Housing Supply
BPS source
Census Bureau Building Permits Survey (BPS) - annual residential permits authorized
📉 Construction Slowdown
Total Permits (2024)
1
housing units authorized
Single-Family
1
detached homes
Multifamily
0
apartments & condos
Supply Intensity
0.1
permits per 1,000 residents
5-Year Permit Trend (2019–2024)
Year
Total
Single-Family
Multifamily
Est. Value
2019
3
3
0
$0.6M
2020
3
3
0
$0.4M
2021
3
3
0
$0.6M
2022
4
4
0
$1.3M
2023
6
6
0
$1.5M
2024
1
1
0
$0.3M
Permit volume decreased 67% from 2019 to 2024.
Commute Patterns
Commute source
How workers travel to work, Census ACS 2023
Drive Alone
72.6%
Carpool
6.9%
Public Transit
1.3%
Walk
8.5%
Work from Home
8.1%
Other
2.6%
Based on 3,830 workers 16 and over.
Monthly Utility Costs
Wisconsin statewide monthly utility average (EIA 2023): $225
EIA 2023 residential energy data puts average monthly utilities across Wisconsin at $225 (electricity about $100 , water and sewer about $45 ).
These are Wisconsin statewide averages, not a meter reading for Ashland. Actual bills vary by home size, usage, and local rates. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) 2023.
Living Costs & Risk
Wisconsin's BEA cost-of-living index is 94.1 (Below Average; US average = 100, RPP 2024). HUD Fair Market Rent for a typical two-bedroom in the county around Ashland is $1,097/mo. FEMA's National Risk Index, averaged to Wisconsin statewide on PlainCities, rates natural-hazard exposure at 59.1 / 100 (Moderate).
Cost/risk geography note
Cost of living is a Wisconsin statewide BEA average; rent is a county-level HUD Fair Market Rent for the county Ashland sits in; the FEMA hazard score shown here is a statewide average of county NRI inputs, not a parcel-level reading.
How Ashland compares to similar-size Wisconsin 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.