Tower, MI population, income and ZIP codes

Tower CDP is a very small community in Michigan, with 271 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #642 of 745 ranked by population — larger than 13% of them. The median age here is 55.3 years against 39.1 nationally, a markedly older profile that usually tracks retirees staying put and younger households leaving for work. At this population the ACS sample is small, so the margin of error around every dollar figure below is wide — treat the numbers as a band, not a point, and expect them to move between annual releases without the place itself changing.

Households in Tower CDP earn a median of $42,167 a year, 46.3% below the national figure of $78,538 and 32% below the $61,715 median for the 438 Michigan cities we cover. The median is the midpoint household, not an average, so a handful of very high earners cannot drag it upward the way they distort a mean. Poverty reaches 23.2% of residents here, well above the 12.4% national rate, which is the single clearest signal in this dataset that median income here is carried by a narrow band of households.

The typical owner-occupied home in Tower CDP is valued at $91,500, 69.8% below the national figure and 45% below the $166,100 peer median, while median gross rent runs $917 a month, 34.8% below the national figure, or roughly $11,004 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 26.1% of gross pay toward that rent against the federal 30% cost-burden threshold, so renting here is within the standard affordability guideline. The home-price-to-income ratio works out to 2.2×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so purchase prices are unusually low against local pay, the pattern in places where supply is plentiful and wage growth has been flat. 63.3% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, so the market leans more heavily on renters. Gross rent folds in the utilities a tenant pays separately, so it is closer to the real monthly outlay than a headline rent figure.

A median age of 55.3 puts Tower CDP well into retirement-weighted territory, which pulls median household income down even where household wealth is high, because retirement draws are counted differently from wages. With 271 residents, a handful of survey responses moves every median on this page. Compare Tower CDP against its county rather than against national figures.

Every value on this page is published directly by the Census for this area — nothing is modelled or interpolated. Small-area estimates still carry wider margins of error than state or national figures, so check the linked ACS tables before relying on them for lending, appraisal or legal work.