Charlottesville city, VA

County Profile

45,437 residents. Safety, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Charlottesville city, VA.

Several figures AreaProfile publishes are measured by county and nowhere finer — death rates by intent among them. On this page those describe the geography they are printed on, which is not true of the city and ZIP pages that inherit them.

65out of 100
Area Score
Top 38% of 1,225 published profiles

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 11% of 1,255 counties78
Schools502nd of 973 counties49
Growth1095th of 1,226 counties27
Housing affordability1214th of 1,255 counties54
ClimateTop 18% of 1,254 counties76
Physical resilienceTop 4% of 1,255 counties94
Access1105th of 1,255 counties54
Economic stability745th of 1,255 counties55
The quick read

Charlottesville city ranks in the top 11% of published profiles for employment opportunity, with unemployment at 3.4% and median household income of $74,824.

Residential permitting has slowed: 115 units authorized over the past twelve months, 87% below the prior year.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published profiles, placing Charlottesville city in the top 4% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
45,437
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$74,824
Top 26% nationally
Density
4,435/sq mi
10.2 sq mi of land
Median age
33.1
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Charlottesville city
Virginia
Metro area
Charlottesville, VA
Nearest major airport
RIC
74 mi · Richmond Intl
Median home value
$486,700
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 3.4% is lower than 83% of the 1,255 measured US locations.

Employment grew 0.9% over the past year, to 24,003 employed residents.

62% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 100% of measured US locations.

MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Median household income ±$5,371$74,824Top 26%2024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$2,644$51,540Top 6%2024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate19.6%Top 18%2024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute18.7 minBottom 10%2024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher62.5%Top 1%2024 ACS 5-Year
Employment24,003Bottom 31%June 2026
Employment change (3 years)0.2%Bottom 49%June 2026
Employment change (year over year)0.9%Top 17%June 2026
Labor force24,838Bottom 30%June 2026
Labor force participation64.7%Top 20%2024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.3%Top 37%June 2026
Unemployment rate3.4%Bottom 17%June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/064.61.9
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 3.4% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
202120222023202475k63k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $74,824 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 — Charlottesville, VA
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Registered Nurses3,040$99,320
Fast Food and Counter Workers2,800$30,150
Retail Salespersons2,540$34,210
General and Operations Managers2,530$107,200
Waiters and Waitresses2,140$44,030
Cashiers2,110$30,930

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.

49% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 61% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 11.1 students for every full-time teacher, fewer than in most measured places.

Public schools
13
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
11.1
across all schools here
Math proficiency
48.5%
Bottom 37% in Virginia
Reading proficiency
61.3%
Bottom 39% in Virginia
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
Charlottesville HighCharlottesville City Public Schools1,43812.6
Walker Upper ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools5709.032%57%
Buford MiddleCharlottesville City Public Schools5638.247%62%
Jackson P. Burley MiddleAlbemarle County Public Schools53412.467%75%
Jackson-Via ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools37012.345%55%
Johnson ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools32711.755%65%
Trailblazer ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools32011.965%69%
Burnley-Moran ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools29912.050%65%
Summit ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools28511.425%35%
Greenbrier ElementaryCharlottesville City Public Schools26713.354%64%
Community Lab School · charterAlbemarle County Public Schools1779.8
Lugo-McGinness AcademyCharlottesville City Public Schools0

72.1% 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 Virginia’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 $1,540 takes 25% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 6.5 times median household income here, well above the historic benchmark, at a level conventionally described as seriously unaffordable.

Rent as a share of income
24.7%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
6.5×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,540
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$486,700
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared with peersSource period
Home price to income6.50Top 2%2024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate44.2%Bottom 1%2024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±8621,610Top 33%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$63$1,540Top 7%2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$16,002$486,700Top 5%2024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income24.7%Top 5%2024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate8.3%Bottom 21%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
27/ 100
Ranks 1095 of 1,226 published city profiles
Permitting is increasing, measured from 2020 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 fallen 4% since 2020, reaching 44,767 in 2024.

Permitting has turned upward after moving the other way the year before.

84% of recently permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes, so new supply is concentrated in apartments and condominiums rather than detached houses.

At 2.5 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is below the median for measured US locations.

Units permitted
115
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
2.5
Bottom 44% nationally
Year over year
−87%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
84.3%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
2020202120222023202446k45k
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
20202021202220232024202588934
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was higher than 2020 (+368%).

Weather & climate

7 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 84°F and January a low of 28°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 48.2 inches.

20°40°60°80°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station CHARLOTTESVILLE 2 SSE, 3.0 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.9"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
Annual precipitation48.2"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low28°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high84°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months71991-2020 Normals
Seasonal temperature swing40°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

94 / 100
Physical resilience

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

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

EarthquakeElevated
HurricaneModerate
Cold waveModerate

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

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA National Risk Index county record. 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.

Charlottesville city 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 9.7 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 14.2 per 100,000 residents in Charlottesville city.

Homicide
2.9
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
9.7
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Drug overdose
14.2
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Suicide
12.2
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 Charlottesville city 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 Charlottesville city rather than Charlottesville city 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

2 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 74 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Richmond IntlRIC74 mi9,003 ft
Washington Dulles IntlIAD84 mi11,500 ft
Baltimore/Washington Intl Thurgood MarshallBWI126 mi10,503 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

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.

Cities in Charlottesville city, VA