ZIP code 49931

ZIP 49931 is a mid-size town in Houghton County, Michigan, with 10,229 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #326 of 992 ranked by population — larger than 67% of them. The median age here is 22.3 years against 39.1 nationally, a distinctly younger profile, typical of places with students, military posts or a fast-growing family population. 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 49931 earn a median of $47,279 a year, 39.8% 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 28.1% 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 49931 is valued at $221,200, 27.1% below the national figure, while median gross rent runs $853 a month, 39.3% below the national figure, or roughly $10,236 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 4.7×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is harder here than in the average US market. 44.6% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, a renter-majority market, so rent figures matter more here than the home-value line. Rent is reported gross — contract rent plus tenant-paid utilities — which is why it runs above the advertised price on a listing for the same unit.

A median age of 22.3 means a large student or early-career population; income medians in places like this understate household resources, since many residents are supported from outside the address.

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 49931 is tabulated inside Houghton County, Michigan, one of 18 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 992 across Michigan. 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 49931 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 49931 reports a median household income of $47,279, 14% below the $55,275 county median, and 29% below the $66,726 typical MI ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $221,200, 107% above the county figure and 23% above the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $853 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

Michigan charges 6% statewide, and no local sales tax is layered on top, so the state rate is the full amount collected in 49931.

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 49931 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.