Miami, FL

ZIP code 33131 is assigned to Miami, FL, and falls within Miami-Dade County. Like every US postal code, it began as a mail-routing device rather than a geographic boundary — the US Postal Service groups delivery routes under a single code so carriers and sorting equipment can process mail efficiently. Today it also serves as a practical shorthand for the area itself: roughly 23,289 people live inside it.

At 46,485 residents per square mile spread over 0.501 square miles, 33131 reads as a dense urban area. It is a mid-sized postal code by population, and density shapes almost everything else on this page — how people get to work, whether they own or rent, and what housing costs.

Household earnings here sit well above the national picture. The median household income of $143,114 places 33131 in the upper reaches of American postal codes, ahead of 96% of them. The US median for comparison is $70,109. Bear in mind that median income describes the midpoint household, not the average — it is not pulled upward by a handful of very high earners the way a mean would be.

Housing in 33131 costs well above the national median. A typical home is valued at $621,700 against a US median of $207,500, and median gross rent runs $2,847 a month. The split between owning and renting is fairly even at 35.5% owner-occupied, which tends to indicate a mix of housing types rather than one dominant form.

The building stock is dominated by larger apartment buildings of twenty units or more, which account for 95.0% of housing units here. The median construction year is 2005, making the housing here relatively modern. The vacancy rate of 30.5% is high, which in many places reflects seasonal or second-home use rather than abandonment.

The population skews broadly in line with the national age profile, with a median age of 36.3 against 42 nationally. Households average just 1.77 people, and 45.2% consist of one person living alone — a signature of areas with a lot of studio and one-bedroom stock.

Getting to work takes 21.4 minutes on average one way. The dominant mode is drove alone at 43.2% of workers, while 17.6% walk, 28.8% work from home. Commute patterns are one of the better proxies for how a place actually functions day to day.

Beyond addressing mail, 33131 does a lot of quiet administrative work. Retailers use it to calculate shipping and sales tax at checkout. Insurers use it to set premiums, since risk profiles vary geographically. Employers and marketers use it to define service areas. Government agencies use it to route benefits and organise reporting. If you have ever been asked for a postal code by a form that clearly does not intend to send you anything, this is why.

For anyone weighing a move, 33131 offers a compact profile of Miami: 23,289 residents, a median household income of $143,114, 76.7% of adults holding a bachelor's degree or higher, and an unemployment rate of 2.7%. A handful of figures like these answer more relocation questions than most neighbourhood guides do.

One caution worth repeating: a postal code is not a neighbourhood. 33131 may cover parts of several distinct areas, and a single neighbourhood in Miami may be split across more than one code. Boundaries also shift as USPS adjusts delivery routes. Treat the figures here as describing a delivery area, which is what they actually measure.