Gadsden, AL

ZIP code 35901 is assigned to Gadsden, AL, and falls within Etowah 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 19,186 people live inside it.

At 324 residents per square mile spread over 59.178 square miles, 35901 reads as a small-town 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 are well below the national median. At $47,826, 35901 ranks among the lower-income postal codes, ahead of 13% 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 35901 costs below the national median. A typical home is valued at $174,200 against a US median of $207,500, and median gross rent runs $747 a month. The split between owning and renting is fairly even at 65.2% owner-occupied, which tends to indicate a mix of housing types rather than one dominant form.

The building stock is dominated by detached single-family houses, which account for 73.7% of housing units here. The median construction year is 1968, making the housing here mid-century. The vacancy rate of 20.3% 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 40 against 42 nationally. The average household holds 2.65 people, and 61.2% are family households.

Getting to work takes 24.4 minutes on average one way. The dominant mode is drove alone at 85.8% of workers.

Beyond addressing mail, 35901 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, 35901 offers a compact profile of Gadsden: 19,186 residents, a median household income of $47,826, 21.8% of adults holding a bachelor's degree or higher, and an unemployment rate of 9.1%. 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. 35901 may cover parts of several distinct areas, and a single neighbourhood in Gadsden 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.