ZIP code 83856

ZIP 83856 is a mid-size town in Bonner County, Idaho, with 6,913 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #61 of 280 ranked by population — larger than 78% of them. The median age here is 50.5 years against 39.1 nationally, a markedly older profile that usually tracks retirees staying put and younger households leaving for work. 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 83856 earn a median of $65,898 a year, 16.1% below the national figure of $78,538. Median household income counts every pre-tax dollar arriving at an address — wages, self-employment, Social Security, pensions, interest and public assistance — for everyone living there, so multi-earner households pull the figure up even where individual pay is modest. Poverty reaches 7% of residents here, below the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in ZIP 83856 is valued at $373,800, 23.2% above the national figure, while median gross rent runs $820 a month, 41.7% below the national figure, or roughly $9,840 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 14.9% of gross pay toward that rent against the federal 30% cost-burden threshold, so renting here is cheap relative to what people here earn. The home-price-to-income ratio works out to 5.7×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is harder here than in the average US market. 85.2% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, an owner-dominated market where rental listings are scarce and rent medians rest on a thin sample. 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 50.5 puts ZIP 83856 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.

No figure on this page is estimated by us; each one comes straight from the published ACS tables for this area. 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 83856 is tabulated inside Bonner County, Idaho, one of 16 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 280 across Idaho. Population sits in the small-town band, typically one main street plus the addresses that feed into it. 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 83856 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 83856 reports a median household income of $65,898, 4% below the $68,595 county median, and 4% below the $68,377 typical ID ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $373,800, 21% below the county figure and 26% above the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $820 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

Idaho charges 6% statewide, and local governments overlapping 83856 may add county, city or special-district levies on top. We publish the state floor for this ZIP rather than guessing a combined figure, because ZIP boundaries and taxing-district boundaries were drawn for different purposes and do not line up.

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 83856 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.