ZIP code 19973

ZIP 19973 is a small city in Sussex County, Delaware, with 25,786 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #15 of 68 ranked by population — larger than 79% of them. The median age here is 42.9 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly older profile than the country as a whole. Places under 65,000 residents only appear in the five-year release, never the one-year file, so these values pool sixty months of responses and lag the current year by design.

Households in ZIP 19973 earn a median of $62,668 a year, 20.2% below the national figure of $78,538. This figure covers the household, not the worker: two people on ordinary wages at one address outrank a single professional in the same table. Poverty reaches 16.4% of residents here, above the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in ZIP 19973 is valued at $254,300, 16.2% below the national figure, while median gross rent runs $1,131 a month, 19.6% below the national figure, or roughly $13,572 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 21.7% 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 4.1×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is harder here than in the average US market. 73.1% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, so the market leans toward owners. The rent line includes utilities paid by the tenant, a definition worth remembering when comparing it against a landlord's quoted rate.

All values below were released by the Census for this exact geography, with no gap-filling on our side. 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.

ZIP 19973 is tabulated inside Sussex County, Delaware, one of 22 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 68 across Delaware. This is a mid-sized suburban ZIP inside a county that is split across many delivery areas. County assignment on this page follows the largest share of the ZIP's land area, which matters where a delivery route crosses a county line: mail addressed to 19973 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 19973 reports a median household income of $62,668, 22% below the $80,672 county median, and 21% below the $79,698 typical DE ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $254,300, 23% below the county figure and 14% below the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $1,131 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

Delaware charges 0% statewide, and no local sales tax is layered on top, so the state rate is the full amount collected in 19973.

Everything above comes from the Census Bureau American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates for this ZIP Code Tabulation Area, with sales tax rates traced to the state revenue agency. Five-year estimates pool sixty months of responses, so they are stable enough to compare 19973 with its neighbours but always trail the current year, and any value the Census suppressed for sample size is shown as unpublished rather than filled in with a model.