ZIP code 12821

ZIP 12821 is a small town in Washington County, New York, with 2,228 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #1004 of 1,824 ranked by population — larger than 44% of them. The median age here is 40.5 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 12821 earn a median of $32,344 a year, 58.8% 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 23.3% 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 12821 is valued at $212,000, 30.1% below the national figure, while median gross rent runs $857 a month, 39% below the national figure, or roughly $10,284 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 31.8% 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 6.6×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is out of reach on local earnings alone and the ownership market leans on outside income, equity or dual high earners. 51.5% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, so the market leans more heavily on renters. The rent line includes utilities paid by the tenant, a definition worth remembering when comparing it against a landlord's quoted rate.

Home values sit at 6.6× median household income, far past the 3.9× national mark, so ownership costs here are set by something other than local wages — second homes, retirees with equity, or commuters earning elsewhere.

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 12821 is tabulated inside Washington County, New York, one of 22 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 1,826 across New York. 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 12821 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 12821 reports a median household income of $32,344, 58% below the $76,979 county median, and 59% below the $79,429 typical NY ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $212,000, close to the county figure and 9% below the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $857 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

New York charges 4% statewide, and local governments overlapping 12821 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 12821 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.