For the average Alabamian who owns a home and has a job, the past five years have probably brought financial gains.

Newly released Census Bureau data shows that incomes and home values are up in every one of the state’s counties, and that a larger share of Alabamians live in a place they own than in the United States as a whole. Growth in incomes statewide also far surpassed the U.S. average.

But the gains, based on the bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) data compiled between 2019 and 2023, were not spread evenly. Median household incomes generally rose the most in those counties where they were already high, and home ownership declined in many of the state’s counties where other data shows poverty maintains a tenacious hold.