Gravesend is a working town of about 60,000 people, most of them at the stage of life with a mortgage and children. Six in ten households own their home. About a fifth rent from a private landlord and about a fifth from a council or housing association. The typical resident is in their late thirties. It is a town of people going to work, with fewer commuters on expense accounts than the trains might suggest.
The 2021 census, the source for every population figure here, counted about 59% of Gravesend's 23,205 households as owner-occupiers. About 21% rented privately and about 19% rented social housing. That is a lot of social housing for a town that sells itself on its fast train to London, and the estates that went up after both world wars account for much of it.
The median resident is 38, and about 28% of people are aged 25 to 44. Gravesend has the age profile of a town where people settle down, buy the three-bed and start on the school applications.
The Office for National Statistics modelled median household income in Gravesend's neighbourhoods at about £56,000 before tax for the financial year to March 2023. Its separate model of income after tax puts the figure at about £41,700. The second number is the one the mortgage and the season ticket come out of.
About 22% of households are couples with children, and about 12% are lone parents with children. Families make up a big share of the town.
About 28% of households are one person living alone. That figure includes the 12% of households who are pensioners living alone, so roughly four in ten of those living alone are over pension age.
At the 2021 census about 27% of adults held a degree or equivalent, about 21% had no formal qualifications and about 2% were full-time students. There is no university here, which is why students barely show up in the figures. Gravesend's young adults are in work, and the ones at university are mostly studying somewhere else.
On the measures used for this page, which take in deprivation, health and qualifications, Gravesend's resident profile is below average, and the neighbourhoods have slipped a little in the latest deprivation index. It is an ordinary working town, made up mainly of families and owners with modest incomes.