New York, NY — O’Brien County has among the lowest per-capita debt in the state — that from a new study.
SmartAsset, a New York financial technology company, recently released a study uncovering the counties across America with the lowest per capita debt and O’Brien County is one of the best in Iowa. Counties were analyzed by the amount of debt residents held across three categories: credit cards, auto, and mortgage, compared to local income.
O’Brien County was listed as having an average income of $28,086. The study said that credit card debt as a percent of income was at 7.2 percent. Auto debt as a percentage of income was at nine percent even. Mortgage debt was listed as 62.5 percent of income. That gave O’Brien County a lowest debt index of 93.52. The higher the index, the less debt is carried on average. O’Brien County placed third in the state in the low debt index, and Clay County was second with 95.57. Wright County placed first.
SmartAsset says their study aims to find the places where people have the least amount of debt. They say they calculated a per-capita debt-to-income ratio for each of the categories for every county. They say they indexed the three ratios for each county and then averaged them to create the Debt Index.
| Rank | County | Income | Credit Card Debt as % of Income | Auto Debt as % of Income | Mortgage Debt as % of Income | Lowest Debt Index |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wright | $25,827 | 7.8% | 7.5% | 41.4% | 96.91 |
| 2 | Clay | $29,060 | 7.6% | 5.5% | 62.8% | 95.57 |
| 3 | O’Brien | $28,086 | 7.2% | 9.0% | 62.5% | 93.52 |
| 4 | Des Moines | $24,408 | 7.9% | 9.1% | 56.7% | 93.11 |
| 5 | Allamakee | $24,926 | 8.8% | 7.3% | 58.0% | 92.94 |
| 6 | Buena Vista | $22,899 | 6.7% | 7.6% | 81.2% | 92.77 |
| 7 | Henry | $22,687 | 7.1% | 12.1% | 55.1% | 92.27 |
| 8 | Kossuth | $29,127 | 6.0% | 7.0% | 100.4% | 91.54 |
| 9 | Jackson | $24,493 | 6.7% | 9.6% | 80.3% | 91.18 |
| 10 | Floyd | $24,590 | 7.0% | 9.4% | 82.9% | 90.40 |
