ZIP code 87421

ZIP 87421 is a small town in San Juan County, New Mexico, with 1,588 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #140 of 372 ranked by population — larger than 62% of them. The median age here is 41.1 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly older 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 87421 earn a median of $49,716 a year, 36.7% below the national figure of $78,538. Household income here is measured before tax and pooled across everyone at the address, which is why it reads higher than typical individual earnings in the same area. Poverty reaches 20.6% 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 87421 is valued at $125,500, 58.6% below the national figure, while median gross rent runs $1,647 a month, 17.1% above the national figure, or roughly $19,764 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 39.8% of gross pay toward that rent against the federal 30% cost-burden threshold, so renting here is a stretch on median earnings. The home-price-to-income ratio works out to 2.5×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is easier here than in the average US market. 75.2% 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.

ZIP 87421 is the unusual combination of expensive to rent and cheap to buy: rent takes 39.8% of median income while homes cost only 2.5× it. Where that pattern shows up, the gap is normally down to down-payment and credit barriers rather than price.

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 87421 is tabulated inside San Juan County, New Mexico, one of 16 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 372 across New Mexico. 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 87421 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 87421 reports a median household income of $49,716, 16% above the $42,966 county median, and 7% below the $53,479 typical NM ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $125,500, close to the county figure and 29% below the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $1,647 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

New Mexico charges 4.875% statewide, and local governments overlapping 87421 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 87421 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.