Mostly homeowners in their forties and fifties, many with a degree. Two in three households own their home. More than four in ten adults have a degree. Only about one household in five is a couple with children at home, whatever the school-run traffic suggests. It's a grown-up town, and it is mostly the grown-ups who own it.
Everything on this page comes from the 2021 census unless it says otherwise. Of Petersfield's 15,344 residents, about 67% of households own their home. About 17% rent privately and about 14% rent from a social landlord, so renting accounts for roughly a third of households, split almost evenly between private landlords and housing associations or the council. That means the town is not all equity and gravel drives. There are enough social tenants for them to be a real part of how it works.
The median age is about 47. People aged 25 to 44 make up about 22% of residents, which is the age group of first homes, young children and the most expensive years of a mortgage. They are here, but they are outnumbered by the people who got onto the ladder earlier and have been climbing ever since.
Office for National Statistics modelling puts average gross household income at about £64,000 before tax, for the financial year to March 2023. That is a figure from before recent pay rises and bill increases, not a current one, and it is an average across the area rather than what the household next door earns. It is comfortable enough for the car park at the leisure centre, and it still needs a second salary to buy a detached house.
The households are a mixture. About 33% of homes have one person living alone, and about 18% of homes are a single pensioner living alone. That second group is part of the first, not an addition to it. Couples with children at home make up about 20% of households and lone parents about 9%. So the stereotype of the market town full of young families is only partly true. A good share of the front doors belong to one person, often older, who stayed put after the children left.
Education levels are high. About 42% of adults hold a degree or equivalent, about 13% have no formal qualifications, and full-time students make up about 2% of residents. There is no university here to add students, so they come and go at the end of each school holiday. The graduate share reflects people who studied elsewhere and settled here later, often with the equity and the loft conversion to show for it.
Only 91 people live in communal settings such as care homes, compared with 15,253 in private households. That number is too small to affect the other figures. The shares above describe ordinary homes.
The people who live in Petersfield are one of its strengths: well educated, mostly owning, doing comfortably and staying put. The town skews older and has fewer young families than its reputation suggests, but the people who do live here stay because they like it.