Hamilton, MT

ZIP code 59840 is assigned to Hamilton, MT, and falls within Ravalli 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 14,775 people live inside it.

At 27 residents per square mile spread over 537.358 square miles, 59840 reads as a rural 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 track close to the national picture. The median of $64,493 puts 59840 near the middle of the pack, ahead of 40% 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 59840 costs well above the national median. A typical home is valued at $398,800 against a US median of $207,500, and median gross rent runs $1,054 a month. The split between owning and renting is fairly even at 68.9% 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 76.6% of housing units here. The median construction year is 1983, making the housing here from the later twentieth century.

The population skews older than the national median, with a median age of 49.1 against 42 nationally. The average household holds 2.29 people, and 62.0% are family households.

Getting to work takes 15.1 minutes on average one way. The dominant mode is drove alone at 72.7% of workers.

Beyond addressing mail, 59840 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, 59840 offers a compact profile of Hamilton: 14,775 residents, a median household income of $64,493, 33.0% of adults holding a bachelor's degree or higher, and an unemployment rate of 1.0%. 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. 59840 may cover parts of several distinct areas, and a single neighbourhood in Hamilton 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.