This is a small community in a single neighborhood.
As throughout the site, some neighborhood-level data are reserved for subscribers.
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.
Ossian is a tiny city located in the state of Iowa. With a population of 783 people and just one neighborhood, Ossian is the 369th largest community in Iowa. Ossian has a large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic cities in the country.
Ossian real estate is some of the most expensive in Iowa, although Ossian house values don't compare to the most expensive real estate in the U.S.
Occupations and Workforce
When you are in Ossian, you'll notice that it is more blue-collar than most other communities in America. 44.35% of Ossian’s employed work in blue-collar jobs, while America averages only 27.7% that do. Overall, Ossian is a city of construction workers and builders, professionals, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in Ossian who work in healthcare (9.13%), office and administrative support (7.61%), and management occupations (7.17%).
Setting & Lifestyle
Overall, Ossian’s crime rate is one of the lowest in the nation, which makes a great place to live if safety is an important concern.
It is a fairly quiet city because there are relatively few of those groups of people who have a tendency to be noisy. (Children, for example, often can't help themselves from being noisy, and being parents ourselves, we know!) Ossian has relatively few families with children living at home, and is quieter because of it. Renters and college students, for their own reasons, can also be noisy. Ossian has few renters and college students. But the biggest reason it is quieter in Ossian than in most places in America, is that there are just simply fewer people living here. If you think trees make good neighbors, Ossian may be for you.
Being a small city, Ossian does not have a public transit system used by locals to get to and from work.
Demographics
In terms of college education, Ossian is nearly on par with the US average for all cities of 21.84%: 17.98% of adults 25 and older in Ossian have a bachelor's degree or advanced degree.
The per capita income in Ossian in 2022 was $35,989, which is middle income relative to Iowa and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $143,956 for a family of four. However, Ossian contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
The people who call Ossian home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Ossian residents report their race to be White, followed by Asian. Important ancestries of people in Ossian include German, Norwegian, Irish, French, and Czech.
The most common language spoken in Ossian is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and German/Yiddish.
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.
Real Estate
Unpopulated, and rural, the neighborhood is one of the least crowded neighborhoods in all of America. If you like open space, no traffic, and lots of room, this neighborhood may be just what you are looking for. According to NeighborhoodScout's leading research, this neighborhood is less densely populated than 94.6% of the neighborhoods in America. One of the notable things about is that it is one of the quietest neighborhoods in America, according to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis and quantitative rating of quietness. When you are here, you will find it to be very quiet. If quiet and peaceful are your cup of tea, you may have found a great place for you.
People
According to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis, is among the best neighborhoods for families in Iowa. In fact, this neighborhood is more family-friendly than 95.3% of neighborhoods in the entire state of Iowa. Its combination of top public schools, low crime rates, and owner-occupied single family homes gives this area the look and feel of a "Leave It to Beaver" episode. Many other families also live here, making it easy to socialize and develop a strong sense of community. In addition, the high number of college-educated parents influences the academic success of the local schools. Overall, you will find all of the amenities a family needs to thrive in the neighborhood. In addition to being an excellent choice for families with school-aged children, this neighborhood is also a very good choice for active retirees.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Norwegian and German ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 23.0% of this neighborhood's residents have Norwegian ancestry and 45.2% have German ancestry.
The Neighbors
There are two complementary measures for understanding the income of a neighborhood's residents: the average and the extremes. While a neighborhood may be relatively wealthy overall, it is equally important to understand the rate of people - particularly children - who are living at or below the federal poverty line, which is extremely low income. Some neighborhoods with a lower average income may actually have a lower childhood poverty rate than another with a higher average income, and this helps us understand the conditions and character of a neighborhood.
The neighbors in the neighborhood in Ossian are upper-middle income, making it an above average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 62.6% of the neighborhoods in America. With 16.0% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 62.8% of U.S. neighborhoods.
What we choose to do for a living reflects who we are. Each neighborhood has a different mix of occupations represented, and together these tell you about the neighborhood and help you understand if this neighborhood may fit your lifestyle.
In the neighborhood, 41.8% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is manufacturing and laborer occupations, with 28.8% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (18.3%), and 9.6% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 93.8% of households. Some people also speak Spanish (5.6%).
Ethnicity / Ancestry
Boston's Beacon Hill blue-blood streets, Brooklyn's Orthodox Jewish enclaves, Los Angeles' Persian neighborhoods. Each has its own culture derived primarily from the ancestries and culture of the residents who call these neighborhoods home. Likewise, each neighborhood in America has its own culture – some more unique than others – based on lifestyle, occupations, the types of households – and importantly – on the ethnicities and ancestries of the people who live in the neighborhood. Understanding where people came from, who their grandparents or great-grandparents were, can help you understand how a neighborhood is today.
In the neighborhood in Ossian, IA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (45.2%). There are also a number of people of Norwegian ancestry (23.0%), and residents who report Irish roots (12.5%), and some of the residents are also of English ancestry (6.5%), along with some Danish ancestry residents (2.5%), among others.
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 neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (42.6% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (78.4%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. 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.
