35150Sylacauga, Alabama

Area Profile

Income, jobs, climate, physical risk and development data for ZIP code 35150.

44out of 100
Area Score
Bottom 5% of 5,298 profiles measured

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
Opportunity6006th of 6,210 ZIP areas measured22
Growth5411th of 5,428 ZIP areas measured4
Housing affordabilityTop 19% of 6,685 ZIP areas measured96
ClimateTop 28% of 6,789 ZIP areas measured76
Physical resilience4874th of 6,709 ZIP areas measured35
Access5628th of 6,791 ZIP areas measured76
Economic stability6382nd of 6,742 ZIP areas measured26
The quick read

Employment conditions sit below most comparable published ZIP profiles: unemployment is 4.5% and the Opportunity signal places 35150 in the bottom 3%.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 20% of median household income and the median home is 2.9 times it.

Physical-risk exposure is above the national median, driven mainly by inland flooding, tornado and heat wave.

At a glance

Population
17,305
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$45,768
Bottom 10% nationally
Density
283/sq mi
61.1 sq mi of land
Median age
39.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
City
Sylacauga
Alabama
Metro area
Talladega-Sylacauga, AL
Nearest major airport
BHM
39 mi · Birmingham-Shuttlesworth Intl
Median home value
$132,100
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.5% is lower than 48% of the 6,544 measured US ZIP areas.

Employment fell 3.8% over the past year, to 32,751 employed residents.

Median household income of $45,768 is below 90% of measured US ZIP areas.

MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Median household income ±$6,327$45,768Bottom 10%of 31,2952024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,978$24,621Bottom 12%of 32,8222024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate24.0%Top 12%of 32,9702024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute26.3 minBottom 42%of 32,8872024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher13.9%Bottom 22%of 33,1932024 ACS 5-Year
Employment32,751Bottom 33%of 6,544June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-3.2%Bottom 10%of 6,542June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-3.8%Bottom 5%of 6,544June 2026
Labor force34,298Bottom 34%of 6,544June 2026
Labor force participation52.2%Bottom 24%of 33,2522024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)1.1%Top 4%of 6,544June 2026
Unemployment rate4.5%Top 48%of 6,544June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202446k37k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $45,768 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish labor-force data for ZIP areas. This is the figure for Sylacauga, AL, the city containing this ZIP code.

There are 17.2 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
6
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
17.2
across all schools here
Math proficiency
Reading proficiency
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Sylacauga High SchoolSylacauga City62715.7
BB Comer Memorial Elementary SchoolTalladega County52118.0
Indian Valley Elementary SchoolSylacauga City47716.4
NicholsLawson Middle SchoolSylacauga City44615.4
Pinecrest Elementary SchoolSylacauga City42620.3
BB Comer Memorial High SchoolTalladega County39519.8

59.8% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Alabama’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $756 takes 20% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 2.9 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
19.8%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
2.9×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$756
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$132,100
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Home price to income2.89Bottom 43%of 30,4042024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate60.9%Bottom 17%of 32,9102024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±4918,330Top 20%of 33,7722024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$65$756Bottom 18%of 26,6182024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$18,994$132,100Bottom 21%of 30,9412024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income19.8%Top 36%of 26,4702024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate10.8%Bottom 49%of 33,0282024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
4/ 100
Ranks 5411 of 5,428 published city profiles

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

At 0.0 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US ZIP areas.

Units permitted
0
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.0
Bottom 1% nationally
Year over year
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
units in 5+ unit buildings

The Building Permits Survey is not published for ZIP areas. This is the figure for Sylacauga, AL, the city containing this ZIP code.

Weather & climate

7 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 90°F and January a low of 31°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 57.1 inches, including 1.7 inches of snow.

20°40°60°80°100°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station SYLACAUGA 4 NE, 2.2 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND5.9"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation57.1"1991-2020 Normals
Annual snowfall1.7"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low31°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high90°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing36°F1991-2020 Normals

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today.

Physical risk

35 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are inland flooding, tornado and heat wave.

TornadoHigh
Inland floodingElevated
Heat waveModerate
EarthquakeModerate
HurricaneModerate
LightningModerate
LandslideModerate

Low or minimal exposure: cold wave, strong wind, wildfire, drought, hail, ice storm, winter weather.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. ZIP values are the land-area-weighted mean of the counties the ZIP Code Tabulation Area intersects. Expected annual loss is not allocated below county level. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences — they say nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Talladega County records 17.3 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, higher than most counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 34.5 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 14.8 per 100,000 residents in Talladega County.

Homicide
17.3
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
34.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
14.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
14.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Talladega County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around 35150 rather than 35150 itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
Offences reported to police are published by department rather than by town, and only where a department reported every month of the year. No municipal department reports for this place — many smaller communities are policed by the county — so there is no figure to show. A partial year is never scaled up to look complete, and arrest counts or news volume are never substituted for it.
Taxes
Taxes are not published: no source covers them nationally with a method open enough to check. Cost of living now is — the index above is the Bureau of Economic Analysis price parity for this area — but it is a price level for all consumption rather than a budget for a household, its spread is driven mostly by housing, and it excludes taxes. Housing affordability is computed separately from rent, price and income, because that answers a narrower and more actionable question. Nothing here is individualised tax advice.
Anything about a specific address
Every figure describes an area, not a street or a house. School attendance zones, insurance pricing and the character of a neighbourhood all vary within the places measured here.

Access

2 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 39 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Birmingham-Shuttlesworth IntlBHM39 mi12,007 ft
Montgomery Rgnl (Dannelly Fld)MGM62 mi9,020 ft
Huntsville Intl-Carl T Jones FldHSV104 mi10,001 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Area Score
44
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Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.

35150 vs Sylacauga

How this ZIP area compares with Sylacauga as a whole. Both figures come from the same ACS release, so the comparison is like for like.

35150
Sylacauga
Median household income
$45,768
vs
$50,017
Per capita income
$24,621
vs
$25,429
Population density
283/sq mi
vs
608/sq mi
Median home value
$132,100
vs
$161,200
Median gross rent
$756
vs
$773
Homeownership rate
60.9%
vs
55.1%
Bachelor's degree or higher
13.9%
vs
17.9%
Poverty rate
24.0%
vs
21.0%
Median age
39.3
vs
37.4

Some demographic statistics use Census ZIP Code Tabulation Areas, which approximate but do not exactly match USPS ZIP delivery geography. See the methodology for how AreaProfile maps between them.