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.
Gerber is a very small town located in the state of California. With a population of 1,044 people and just one neighborhood, Gerber is the 749th largest community in California.
Occupations and Workforce
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, Gerber is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 38.12% of the Gerber workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, Gerber is a town of professionals, farmers, fishers, or foresters, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in Gerber who work in farm management occupations (22.03%), teaching (20.54%), and healthcare (15.10%).
Another important characteristic of Gerber is that a lot of people work in agricultural jobs, especially compared to most other communities in America, and there are quite a number of farms in town.
Setting & Lifestyle
Compared to the rest of the country, citizens of Gerber spend much less time in their cars: on average, their commute to work is only 16.81 minutes. This also means that noise and pollution levels in the town are less than they would otherwise be.
Being a small town, Gerber does not have a public transit system used by locals to get to and from work.
Demographics
The education level of Gerber citizens, measured as those with bachelor's degrees or advanced degrees, is similar to the national average for all American cities and towns. 19.03% of adults 25 and older in Gerber have a college degree.
The per capita income in Gerber in 2022 was $31,043, which is lower middle income relative to California, and middle income relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $124,172 for a family of four. However, Gerber contains both very wealthy and poor people as well. Gerber also has one of the higher rates of people living in poverty in the nation, with 31.46% of its population below the federal poverty line.
Gerber is an extremely ethnically-diverse town. The people who call Gerber home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. People of Hispanic or Latino origin are the most prevalent group in Gerber, accounting for 81.00% of the town’s residents (people of Hispanic or Latino origin can be of any race). The greatest number of Gerber residents report their race to be White, followed by Native American. Important ancestries of people in Gerber include Irish, English, Czechoslovakian, Finnish, and Yugoslavian.
Foreign born people are also an important part of Gerber's cultural character, accounting for 34.78% of the town’s population.
The most common language spoken in Gerber is Spanish. Other important languages spoken here include English and Polish.
Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics
Many things matter about a neighborhood, but the first thing most people notice is the way a neighborhood looks and its particular character. For example, one might notice whether the buildings all date from a certain time period or whether shop signs are in multiple languages. This particular neighborhood in Gerber, the neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Occupations
Each year, fewer and fewer Americans make their living as farmers, foresters, or fishers. But the neighborhood truly stands out among U.S. neighborhoods. According to exclusive NeighborhoodScout analysis, this neighborhood has a greater proportion of farmers, foresters, or fishers than 98.8% of all American neighborhoods. This is truly a unique cultural characteristic of this neighborhood.
People
Of note, 55.1% of the children in this area live in poverty; an extraordinarily high percentage compared to other neighborhoods in the nation. In a nation where approximately one in four children grows up in poverty, this neighborhood stands out for the depth of the problem manifested here.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Czechoslovakian and Native American ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 1.1% of this neighborhood's residents have Czechoslovakian ancestry and 2.5% have Native American ancestry.
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 Gerber are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 79.1% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 55.1% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 95.7% of U.S. neighborhoods.
A neighborhood is far different if it is dominated by enlisted military personnel rather than people who earn their living by farming. It is also different if most of the neighbors are clerical support or managers. What is wonderful is the sheer diversity of neighborhoods, allowing you to find the type that fits your lifestyle and aspirations.
In the neighborhood, 25.1% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations, with 25.0% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (21.9%), and 18.5% in manufacturing and laborer occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 61.3% of households. Some people also speak Spanish (38.4%).
Ethnicity / Ancestry
Culture is the shared learned behavior of peoples. Undeniably, different ethnicities and ancestries have different cultural traditions, and as a result, neighborhoods with concentrations of residents of one or another ethnicities or ancestries will express those cultures. It is what makes the North End in Boston so fun to visit for the Italian restaurants, bakeries, culture, and charm, and similarly, why people enjoy visiting Chinatown in San Francisco.
In the neighborhood in Gerber, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Mexican (43.8%). There are also a number of people of German ancestry (8.3%), and residents who report English roots (7.6%), and some of the residents are also of Irish ancestry (6.1%), along with some Italian ancestry residents (4.1%), among others. In addition, 13.6% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.
Getting to Work
Even if your neighborhood is walkable, you may still have to drive to your place of work. Some neighborhoods are located where many can get to work in just a few minutes, while others are located such that most residents have a long and arduous commute. The greatest number of commuters in neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (41.1% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (74.1%) 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 (6.9%) . 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.
