What do we mean by a neighborhood?
NeighborhoodScout® uses the official government designation for neighborhoods - the census tract.
Census tracts are small, relatively permanent subdivisions of a county that are defined by the U.S. Census Bureau in conjunction with local authorities all across the country to define real neighborhoods that are bounded to contain areas with homogeneous population characteristics (including economic status, lifestyle, and living conditions). Census tracts usually have 4,000 persons, but can range between 1,500 and 8,000 persons. This is the most fine-grained area for which detailed information is made available from the government, to protect the individual privacy of each of us. Because census tracts are based on population, they vary in size depending on the density of settlement. In urban areas, they are small, and in rural areas they can cover an entire small town or even a few small towns in very rural areas.
Since census tracts are subdivisions of a county, we did a spatial overlay of the census tracts onto city and town boundaries using a geographic information system to properly assign each census tract to its appropriate city or town. Then we named each census tract to the local colloquially recognized neighborhood name for that spot (e.g., Boston, MA (Dorchester). If there was not a name available, we named the census tract by the largest street intersection in the census tract (e.g., Worcester, MA (Lincoln St/Plantation St)
Why we don't use Zip Codes as neighborhoods
Zip codes were developed by the Postal Service for the purpose of delivering mail, but were never intended to define coherent neighborhoods. In addition, Zip Codes can have as many as 10 distinctly different census tracts contained within them. When distinct census tracts are blended together in a single Zip Code, the data reflects their average conditions and often gives a false sense of the area. The result is that potentially great matching neighborhoods can be missed, and erroneous matches can also be produced and delivered to you.
Using census tracts makes great matches possible, and helps people find the areas that are best for them and their families. Because we are committed to providing the highest possible quality and finding the neighborhoods that best meet your criteria, we use census tracts. And, as always, we show you the actual street map of the neighborhood so you know exactly where your best matching neighborhood is located.
What is a Condition Alert?
A condition alert is a condition in the neighborhood that triggers an alert. NeighborhoodScout contains condition alerts to highlight conditions that are extreme, whether good or bad. This helps answer crucial questions about the state of the neighborhood being evaluated, such as:
What are the risks of violent crime here?
Is the risk of home break-ins or other property crimes increasing?
Does real estate here hold its value?
Are the trends in local vacancies or unemployment concerning?
...and dozens more.
Information at a glance that you need to know to invest, appraise or finance a property.
Western Addition median real estate price is $1,435,746, which is more expensive than 74.6% of the neighborhoods in California and 92.9% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Western Addition is currently $3,987, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. The average rental cost in this neighborhood is higher than 73.0% of the neighborhoods in California.
Western Addition is a densely urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in San Francisco, California.
Western Addition real estate is primarily made up of small (studio to two bedroom) to medium sized (three or four bedroom) apartment complexes/high-rise apartments and small apartment buildings. Most of the residential real estate is renter occupied. Many of the residences in the Western Addition neighborhood are relatively historic, built no later than 1939, and in some cases, quite a bit earlier. A number of residences were also built between 1970 and 1999.
Western Addition has a 13.9% vacancy rate, which is well above average compared to other U.S. neighborhoods (higher than 75.2% of American neighborhoods). Most vacant housing here is vacant year round. This could either signal that there is a weak demand for real estate in the neighborhood or that large amount of new housing has been built and not yet occupied. Either way, if you live here, you may find many of the homes or apartments are empty.
Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics
The way a neighborhood looks and feels when you walk or drive around it, from its setting, its buildings, and its flavor, can make all the difference. This neighborhood has some really cool things about the way it looks and feels as revealed by NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research. This might include anything from the housing stock to the types of households living here to how people get around.
Modes of Transportation
More people ride the bus in this neighborhood each day to get to work than 99.5% of U.S. neighborhoods.
Also, if your dream is to be able to ride your bike to work each day, look no further than this unique neighborhood. With 5.8% of residents in the Western Addition neighborhood commuting on a bicycle to and from work daily, this neighborhood has more bicycle commuters than 98.6% of all neighborhoods in the U.S., according to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis.
Real Estate
If you like crowded places, then you will probably enjoy the the Western Addition neighborhood. According to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive data analysis, this neighborhood is more densely populated than 96.8% of neighborhoods in the U.S., with 29,135 people per square mile living here. Even if you drive or take transit to your place of employment, many people enjoy being able to walk in their neighborhood. What many people don't realize is that most of America's premier vacation locations are also very walkable. The Western Addition neighborhood is among the top 5% of American neighborhoods in terms of walkability.
Occupations
The Western Addition neighborhood has a higher proportion of its residents employed as executives, managers and professionals than 96.1% of the neighborhoods in America. In fact, 71.2% of the employed people here make a living as an executive, a manager, or other professional. With such a high concentration, this truly shapes the character of this neighborhood, and to a large degree defines what this neighborhood is about.
Diversity
Did you know that the Western Addition neighborhood has more Ukrainian and Asian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 1.9% of this neighborhood's residents have Ukrainian ancestry and 27.1% have Asian ancestry.
Western Addition is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 9.8% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Korean at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 99.6% of the neighborhoods in America.
The Neighbors
How wealthy a neighborhood is, from very wealthy, to middle income, to low income is very formative with regard to the personality and character of a neighborhood. Equally important is the rate of people, particularly children, who live below the federal poverty line. In some wealthy gated communities, the areas immediately surrounding can have high rates of childhood poverty, which indicates other social issues. NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals both aspects of income and poverty for this neighborhood.
The neighbors in the Western Addition neighborhood in San Francisco are wealthy, making it among the 15% highest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 86.5% of the neighborhoods in America. In addition, 7.3% of the children seventeen and under living in this neighborhood are living below the federal poverty line, which is a lower rate of childhood poverty than is found in 57.7% of America's neighborhoods.
The old saying "you are what you eat" is true. But it is also true that you are what you do for a living. The types of occupations your neighbors have shape their character, and together as a group, their collective occupations shape the culture of a place.
In the Western Addition neighborhood, 71.2% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants, with 19.0% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (4.8%), and 4.6% in government jobs, whether they are in local, state, or federal positions.
Languages
The languages spoken by people in this neighborhood are diverse. These are tabulated as the languages people preferentially speak when they are at home with their families. The most common language spoken in the Western Addition neighborhood is English, spoken by 68.2% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Korean, Chinese, Spanish and Arabic.
Ethnicity / Ancestry
Culture is shared learned behavior. We learn it from our parents, their parents, our houses of worship, and much of our culture – our learned behavior – comes from our ancestors. That is why ancestry and ethnicity can be so interesting and important to understand: places with concentrations of people of one or more ancestries often express those shared learned behaviors and this gives each neighborhood its own culture. Even different neighborhoods in the same city can have drastically different cultures.
In the Western Addition neighborhood in San Francisco, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Asian (27.1%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (8.1%), and residents who report German roots (7.0%), and some of the residents are also of English ancestry (6.2%), along with some Mexican ancestry residents (5.1%), among others. In addition, 28.5% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.
Getting to Work
How you get to work – car, bus, train or other means – and how much of your day it takes to do so is a large quality of life and financial issue. Especially with gasoline prices rising and expected to continue doing so, the length and means of one's commute can be a financial burden. Some neighborhoods are physically located so that many residents have to drive in their own car, others are set up so many walk to work, or can take a train, bus, or bike. The greatest number of commuters in Western Addition neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (36.4% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (29.1%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also ride the bus to get to work (27.0%) and 9.1% of residents also hop out the door and walk to work for their daily commute. In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.
SCOUT’s patented match algorithm identifies the most similar neighborhoods to a subject location, and quantifies the similarity to the subject location. This allows analysts to identify the most similar neighborhoods in a local market area for appraisals, investments, and research.
The algorithm uses 273 neighborhood conditions, identifies the dominant dimensions underlying the conditions and calculates the similarity. This captures the true culture and character of locations, economic conditions, and trends.
The closer to 100% means the locations are nearly identical. 80% is a very good, but not excellent match, and so forth.
