ZIP code 23185

ZIP 23185 is a small city in James City County, Virginia, with 54,411 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it #19 of 903 ranked by population — larger than 98% of them. The median age here is 39.8 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly older profile than the country as a whole. 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 23185 earn a median of $103,507 a year, 31.8% above the national figure of $78,538. This figure covers the household, not the worker: two people on ordinary wages at one address outrank a single professional in the same table. Poverty reaches 7.7% of residents here, below the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in ZIP 23185 is valued at $413,500, 36.3% above the national figure, while median gross rent runs $1,425 a month, 1.4% above the national figure, or roughly $17,100 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 16.5% 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 4×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is harder here than in the average US market. 73.3% 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.

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 23185 is tabulated inside James City County, Virginia, one of 4 ZIP areas the Census publishes for that county and 903 across Virginia. This is a dense urban ZIP, where a single postal boundary can hold more residents than an entire rural county. 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 23185 can be handled by a post office in a neighbouring county even though the tabulation area is filed here.

Against its own county, 23185 reports a median household income of $103,507, close to the $103,507 county median, and 43% above the $72,517 typical VA ZIP. Owner-occupied homes are valued at a median of $413,500, close to the county figure and 62% above the statewide ZIP median. Rent is reported gross — the contract amount plus tenant-paid utilities — at $1,425 a month, which is why it reads higher than the advertised rent on a listing for the same unit.

Virginia charges 4.3% statewide, and local governments overlapping 23185 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 23185 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.