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.
Browns Valley is a tiny city located in the state of Minnesota. With a population of 511 people and just one neighborhood, Browns Valley is the 443rd largest community in Minnesota. Browns Valley has an unusually large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic cities.
Occupations and Workforce
Browns Valley is a blue-collar town, with 36.86% of people working in blue-collar occupations, while the average in America is just 27.7%. Overall, Browns Valley is a city of service providers, transportation and shipping workers, and managers. There are especially a lot of people living in Browns Valley who work in maintenance occupations (16.53%), management occupations (14.83%), and healthcare suport services (13.14%).
A relatively large number of people in Browns Valley telecommute to their jobs. Overall, about 19.37% of the workforce works from home. While this may seem like a small number, as a fraction of the total workforce it ranks among the highest in the country. These workers are often telecommuters who work in knowledge-based, white-collar professions. For example, Silicon Valley has large numbers of people who telecommute. Other at-home workers may be self-employed people who operate small businesses out of their homes.
Setting & Lifestyle
Overall, Browns Valley’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!) Browns Valley 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. Browns Valley has few renters and college students. But the biggest reason it is quieter in Browns Valley than in most places in America, is that there are just simply fewer people living here. If you think trees make good neighbors, Browns Valley may be for you.
Residents of the city have the good fortune of having one of the shortest daily commutes compared to the rest of the country. On average, they spend only 18.39 minutes getting to work every day.
As is often the case in a small city, Browns Valley doesn't have a public transportation system that people use for their commute.
Demographics
The population of Browns Valley has a very low overall level of education: only 6.85% of people over 25 hold a 4-year college degree or higher.
The per capita income in Browns Valley in 2022 was $22,118, which is low income relative to Minnesota and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $88,472 for a family of four. However, Browns Valley contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
Browns Valley is an extremely ethnically-diverse city. The people who call Browns Valley home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Browns Valley residents report their race to be White, followed by Native American. Important ancestries of people in Browns Valley include German, Norwegian, Swedish, French, and Irish.
The most common language spoken in Browns Valley is English. Other important languages spoken here include Native American languages and Polish.
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 98.4% of the neighborhoods in America.
In addition, despite all of the residential real estate here in the neighborhood, NeighborhoodScout has discovered that much of it is vacant. In resort or second-home vacation areas, this naturally occurs because homes and apartments are seasonally occupied, and empty for a portion of the year. In non-vacation or resort areas, however, this can be an indicator of property abandonment or a weak real estate market. The vacancy rate here is 36.6%, which is higher than 96.8% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
People
Priests and therapists would like to think they know the secrets to a truly successful marriage, but according to NeighborhoodScout's research, the folks of the neighborhood may actually hold the key. 70.6% of its residents are married, which is a higher percentage than is found in 96.8% of the neighborhoods in America.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more German and Norwegian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 49.9% of this neighborhood's residents have German ancestry and 18.8% have Norwegian ancestry.
is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 1.2% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Native American languages at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 97.9% 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 neighborhood in Browns Valley are middle-income, making it a moderate income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 48.6% of the neighborhoods in America. With 14.7% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 59.5% 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, 45.9% 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 21.6% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (16.1%), and 14.4% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 95.3% of households. Some people also speak Polish (3.8%).
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 Browns Valley, MN, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (49.9%). There are also a number of people of Norwegian ancestry (18.8%), and residents who report Native American roots (13.6%), and some of the residents are also of Swedish ancestry (8.5%), along with some Irish ancestry residents (7.9%), 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 under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (43.1% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (67.7%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also carpool with coworkers, friends, or neighbors to get to work (8.6%) . 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.
