Arbutus, Maryland

Area Profile

22,507 residents. Public schools, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Arbutus, in Baltimore County.

Area Score unavailable

Missing required signal: growth. AreaProfile withholds a score rather than inferring the missing dimensions.

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 24% of 3,904 published cities69
Schools1778th of 2,668 published cities38
Housing affordabilityTop 14% of 4,223 published cities97
ClimateTop 44% of 4,223 published cities71
Physical resilienceTop 7% of 4,182 published cities94
AccessTop 19% of 4,226 published cities98
Economic stabilityTop 33% of 4,226 published cities68
The quick read

Arbutus ranks in the top 24% of published city profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 4.1% and median household income of $99,090.

Housing is more affordable relative to local incomes than in most published city profiles: rent takes 16% of median household income and the median home is 3.3 times it.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published city profiles, placing Arbutus in the top 7% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
22,507
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$99,090
Top 19% nationally
Density
3,449/sq mi
6.5 sq mi of land
Median age
33.9
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Baltimore County
Maryland
Metro area
Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD
Nearest major airport
BWI
5 mi · Baltimore/Washington Intl Thurgood Marshall
Median home value
$322,600
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.1% is lower than 59% of the 3,904 measured US cities.

Employment grew 0.4% over the past year, to 430,839 employed residents.

42% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 83% of measured US cities.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$5,241$99,090Top 19%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,930$44,292Top 25%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate14.0%Top 39%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute25.9 minBottom 46%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher41.8%Top 17%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment430,839Top 17%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)-0.2%Bottom 47%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.4%Top 21%June 2026
Labor force449,178Top 17%June 2026
Labor force participation74.2%Top 10%2024 ACS 5-Year
Mean annual wage$76,370Top 27%2025 OEWS
Median annual wage$59,070Top 25%2025 OEWS
Unemployment change (year over year)-0.1%Bottom 40%June 2026
Unemployment rate4.1%Bottom 41%June 2026
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202499k89k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $99,090 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.
Largest occupations — Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
General and Operations Managers44,960$117,040
Retail Salespersons39,920$34,800
Registered Nurses30,930$99,550
Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive29,780$49,220
Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand28,350$43,250
Home Health and Personal Care Aides26,880$37,640

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes city-level labor data only for places of 25,000 or more. This is the figure for Baltimore County, MD, which contains this city.

7% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 19% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 14.2 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
10
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
14.2
across all schools here
Math proficiency
7.1%
Bottom 26% in Maryland
Reading proficiency
18.7%
Bottom 38% in Maryland
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Lansdowne HighBaltimore County Public Schools1,31314.8
Arbutus MiddleBaltimore County Public Schools97416.28%32%
Lansdowne MiddleBaltimore County Public Schools66113.03%12%
Lansdowne ElementaryBaltimore County Public Schools60314.43%10%
Relay ElementaryBaltimore County Public Schools58115.313%22%
Riverview ElementaryBaltimore County Public Schools55214.94%9%
Baltimore Highlands ElementaryBaltimore County Public Schools46114.94%11%
Arbutus ElementaryBaltimore County Public Schools41016.418%28%
Halethorpe ElementaryBaltimore County Public Schools27310.98%18%
Maiden Choice SchoolBaltimore County Public Schools1185.6

65.1% 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 Maryland’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 $1,318 takes 16% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.3 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
16.0%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.3×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,318
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$322,600
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income3.26Top 41%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate69.2%Bottom 36%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±4758,618Top 7%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$227$1,318Top 27%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$12,756$322,600Top 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income16.0%Bottom 31%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate2.3%Bottom 16%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 →

No building-permit activity is published for this location by the Census Building Permits Survey.

Weather & climate

6 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 30°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 43.7 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 45, in the Good band, and about 5 days a year pass 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

20°40°60°80°100°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station MD SCI CTR BALTIMORE, 5.2 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.7"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index71.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation43.7"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low30°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high90°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months61991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10052024 calendar year
Median air quality index45.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing45°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
45
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
71
90th percentile index
Days above 100
5
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

94 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are hurricane, earthquake and cold wave.

HurricaneModerate
EarthquakeModerate
Cold waveModerate
DroughtModerate
LandslideModerate

Low or minimal exposure: winter weather, heat wave, lightning, strong wind, inland flooding, hail, tornado, coastal flooding, ice storm, wildfire, avalanche.

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.

Baltimore County records 6.2 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 12.5 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 21.8 per 100,000 residents in Baltimore County.

Homicide
6.2
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
12.5
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
21.8
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
12.5
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 Baltimore 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 Arbutus rather than Arbutus 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 5 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Baltimore/Washington Intl Thurgood MarshallBWI5 mi10,503 ft
Washington Dulles IntlIAD46 mi11,500 ft
Harrisburg IntlMDT66 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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Other cities in Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD

Same metropolitan area, measured the same way
CityCountyPopulationArea ScoreCompare
BaltimoreBaltimore city573,24359vs Arbutus
ColumbiaHoward County104,338vs Arbutus
Ellicott CityHoward County75,257vs Arbutus
Glen BurnieAnne Arundel County72,590vs Arbutus
DundalkBaltimore County65,969vs Arbutus
TowsonBaltimore County58,679vs Arbutus
SevernAnne Arundel County58,402vs Arbutus
Bel Air SouthHarford County58,137vs Arbutus
OdentonAnne Arundel County45,002vs Arbutus
CatonsvilleBaltimore County43,368vs Arbutus
AnnapolisAnne Arundel County40,72080vs Arbutus
EssexBaltimore County40,580vs Arbutus

Every city here is measured on the same scale from the same source releases, so the comparison is like for like. A higher Area Score reflects AreaProfile’s standardized weighting rather than a judgment about which is the better place to live.

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
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics
2025 OEWSAnnual (spring release)
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 Arbutus

1 published ZIP profiles
ZIPPopulationMedian household incomeArea Score
2122734,907$85,986