New Castle, Indiana

Area Profile

17,367 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for New Castle, in Henry County.

65out of 100
Area Score
Top 36% of 2,944 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 28% of 3,904 published cities67
Schools1707th of 2,668 published cities41
GrowthTop 47% of 2,973 published cities52
Housing affordabilityTop 9% of 4,223 published cities100
Climate2537th of 4,223 published cities68
Physical resilienceTop 43% of 4,182 published cities65
Access3631st of 4,226 published cities72
Economic stability3834th of 4,226 published cities32
The quick read

Unemployment is 3.4% and median household income $51,606, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published city profiles.

In the public schools here, 31% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 12.5 students for every teacher.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 18% of median household income and the median home is 1.9 times it.

At a glance

Population
17,367
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$51,606
Bottom 25% nationally
Density
2,371/sq mi
7.3 sq mi of land
Median age
41.2
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Henry County
Indiana
Metro area
New Castle, IN
Nearest major airport
IND
51 mi · Indianapolis Intl
Median home value
$98,000
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.4% is lower than 87% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment grew 0.8% over the past year, to 22,091 employed residents.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$4,517$51,606Bottom 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,671$28,155Bottom 30%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate20.1%Top 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute21.8 minBottom 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher13.3%Bottom 29%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment22,091Bottom 28%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)5.8%Top 4%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.8%Top 15%June 2026
Labor force22,880Bottom 28%June 2026
Labor force participation57.8%Bottom 41%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)-0.5%Bottom 17%June 2026
Unemployment rate3.4%Bottom 13%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202452k46k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $51,606 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 publishes city-level labor data only for places of 25,000 or more. This is the figure for Henry County, IN, which contains this city.

31% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 34% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 12.5 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
9
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
12.5
across all schools here
Math proficiency
31.3%
Bottom 32% in Indiana
Reading proficiency
33.7%
Bottom 26% in Indiana
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
New Castle High SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp82811.5
New Castle Middle SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp62711.422%37%
Blue River Valley Elementary SchBlue River Valley Schools33114.435%25%
Wilbur Wright Elementary SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp30513.331%38%
Blue River Valley Jr-Sr High SchBlue River Valley Schools28913.85%35%
Parker Elementary SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp27812.621%18%
Eastwood Elementary SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp2579.941%28%
Westwood Elementary SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp25616.054%45%
James Whitcomb Riley Elem SchoolNew Castle Community School Corp24615.461%44%

57.0% 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 Indiana’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 $781 takes 18% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 1.9 times median household income here, close to the historic benchmark for an affordable market.

Rent as a share of income
18.2%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
1.9×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$781
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$98,000
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income1.90Bottom 20%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate61.5%Bottom 23%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±2998,417Top 7%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$60$781Bottom 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$5,097$98,000Bottom 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income18.2%Bottom 47%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate14.6%Top 35%2024 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
52/ 100
Top 47% of 2,973 published city profiles
Permitting is decreasing, measured from 2022 to 2025.

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.

Population has been broadly flat since 2020, at 17,382 in 2024.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 0% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 0.9 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US cities.

Units permitted
15
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
0.9
Bottom 28% nationally
Year over year
+15%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
0.0%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202417k17k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
2022202320242025144.0
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was higher than 2022 (+100%).

Weather & climate

6 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 86°F and January a low of 21°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 40.3 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 34, in the Good band, and no day in the year passed 100.

10°30°50°70°90°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station MUNCIE DELAWARE CO AP, 21.8 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.8"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index55.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation40.3"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low21°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high86°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months61991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10002024 calendar year
Median air quality index34.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing47°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
34
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
55
90th percentile index
Days above 100
0
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

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. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

65 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are tornado, earthquake and hail.

Overall hazard risk is lower than 76% of measured US cities.

TornadoHigh
EarthquakeElevated
HailModerate
LightningModerate
Strong windModerate
Heat waveModerate
Cold waveModerate

Low or minimal exposure: ice storm, inland flooding, winter weather, landslide, drought, hurricane, wildfire.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA publishes at county level. City values are the population-weighted mean of the counties the city overlaps, using AreaProfile place-to-county land-area weights. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Henry County records 2.9 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, near the middle of counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 14.4 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 24.5 per 100,000 residents in Henry County.

Homicide
2.9
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
14.4
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
24.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
22.5
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 Henry 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 New Castle rather than New Castle 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
The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer is the only source for reported offences with national coverage and a published method, and it requires an API key AreaProfile does not hold. Arrest counts, news volume and commercial “safety scores” are not substituted in the meantime. What is published above under Safety is a different measurement — deaths rather than offences, from death certificates rather than police returns — and it covers no property crime at all.
Taxes
No tax dataset has met the source admission test for coverage, transparent methodology and update cadence. Nothing here is individualized tax advice.
Full cost of living
No public source publishes one with national coverage and a documented method. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings.

Access

4 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 51 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Indianapolis IntlIND51 mi11,200 ft
James M Cox Dayton IntlDAY61 mi8,502 ft
Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky IntlCVG71 mi10,000 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
65
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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
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

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.

ZIP codes in New Castle

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
4736229,337$60,25866