ZIP code 42085

ZIP 42085 is a very small community in Graves County, Kentucky, with 918 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #477 of 779 ranked by population — larger than 38% of them. The median age here is 36.7 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly younger profile than the country as a whole. 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 ZIP 42085 earn a median of $55,662 a year, 29.1% below the national figure of $78,538. 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 31.2% 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 ZIP 42085 is valued at $101,800, 66.4% below the national figure, while median gross rent runs $743 a month, 47.2% below the national figure, or roughly $8,916 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 16% 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 1.8×, 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. 74.8% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, so the market leans toward owners. Gross rent folds in the utilities a tenant pays separately, so it is closer to the real monthly outlay than a headline rent figure.

With 918 residents, a handful of survey responses moves every median on this page. Compare ZIP 42085 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.

ZIP 42085 is tabulated inside Graves County, Kentucky, one of 11 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 779 across Kentucky. Fewer than 2,500 people are counted here, so the ZIP behaves like a village delivery route rather than a neighbourhood. 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 42085 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 42085 reports a median household income of $55,662, 11% below the $62,354 county median, and 3% above the $53,906 typical KY ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $101,800, 35% below the county figure and 22% below the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $743 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

Kentucky charges 6% statewide, and no local sales tax is layered on top, so the state rate is the full amount collected in 42085.

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 42085 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.