Settled homeowners in the middle of life, mostly. Seven in ten own their home. The typical resident is in their early forties. A quarter of households are couples raising children. Billingshurst is where people stop moving house and start arguing about the fence.
Every population figure here comes from the 2021 Census, which counted 10,217 people in 4,233 households. About 71% of households own their home, outright or with a mortgage. About 12% rent privately and about 14% rent from a council or housing association, so social renters slightly outnumber private tenants. That's unusual for a village with these prices, and it means the landlord-and-letting-agent economy that dominates many commuter places barely gets a foothold here.
The median age is about 41, and about 25% of residents are aged 25 to 44. It's neither a retirement village nor a young professionals' patch. The age profile looks like a place people move to once, with a mortgage and a plan, and then don't leave for a long time.
The Office for National Statistics models average household income here at about £65,000 a year before tax, for the financial year to March 2023. That's a gross figure for the whole household, not a salary, and it describes a period now more than three years old. It's comfortable money for a village, and it goes on mortgages, second cars and extensions rather than anything that would get noticed from the street.
Households come in every shape. About 25% are couples with dependent children and about 9% are lone parents. About 27% are one-person households, and within that group, about 14% of all households are pensioners living alone. That last figure deserves more attention than it gets: behind the family-house image, one front door in seven belongs to an older person on their own, and they tend to be the residents who know which neighbour is away and which one hasn't put the bins out.
On qualifications, about 35% of residents hold a degree-level qualification and about 12% have none. Full-time students make up about 2%, which is what happens in a place with no university and a station most people don't commute from. It's a mixed picture, with graduates and tradespeople on the same roads, and the business rates list full of workshops suggests plenty of them are earning without a degree to show for it.
A small number of residents, 23 in total, live in communal settings such as care homes rather than private households. That's too few to shift any of the shares above.
Billingshurst is home to a comfortable, settled population that has mostly finished shopping around for somewhere to live. It suits buyers looking for stable neighbours, and it will feel slow to anyone still hunting for a scene.