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.
Creston Heights median real estate price is $217,207, which is more expensive than 39.2% of the neighborhoods in Michigan and 24.3% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Creston Heights is currently $2,270, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. The average rental cost in this neighborhood is higher than 85.8% of the neighborhoods in Michigan.
Creston Heights is an urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Creston Heights real estate is primarily made up of medium sized (three or four bedroom) to small (studio to two bedroom) single-family homes and small apartment buildings. Most of the residential real estate is occupied by a mixture of owners and renters. Many of the residences in the Creston Heights 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 2000 and the present.
Home and apartment vacancy rates are 8.3% in Creston Heights. NeighborhoodScout analysis shows that this rate is lower than 46.7% of the neighborhoods in the nation, approximately near the middle range for vacancies.
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 Grand Rapids, the Creston Heights neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Occupations
There are more people living in the Creston Heights neighborhood employed as sales and service workers (54.8%) than almost any neighborhood in the country. From fast-food service workers to major sales accounts, sales and service workers make up the largest proportion of our national employment picture. But despite that size and importance nationally, this neighborhood still stands out as unique due to the dominance of people living here who work in such occupations.
People
Whether by choice, divorce, or unplanned pregnancy, single moms may have the toughest job in the book. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that the Creston Heights neighborhood has more single mother households than 98.3% of the neighborhoods in the U.S. Often high concentrations of single mother homes can be a strong indicator of family and social issues such as poverty, high rates of school dropouts, crime, and other societal problems.
Real Estate
Three-deckers, duplexes, old Victorian homes cut up into apartments. Independent stores on the corner selling pizza. These are some of the hallmarks of neighborhoods with lots of small 2, 3, and 4 unit apartment buildings. The Creston Heights neighborhood really stands out in this regard, however, as it is dominated by such small apartment buildings more than nearly any other neighborhood in America. This is a stunning visual and lifestyle example of this type of neighborhood. In fact, 38.8% of the real estate here are small 2, 3, or 4 unit apartment buildings, which is a higher proportion than found in 96.8% of America's neighborhoods.
In addition, do you watch 'This Old House' on Public Television? Do you love the idea of fixing up a Colonial or Victorian era home, complete with the charm of yesteryear? Do you like to stroll or drive streets lined with gracious older residences? If you found yourself nodding yes to any of these questions, you are going to be interested in this unique neighborhood. The Creston Heights neighborhood stands out on a national scale for the sheer concentration of historic residences it contains: 63.5% of the residential real estate here was built from 1939 or earlier, some much earlier. This is a greater concentration of historic homes than 97.3% of the neighborhoods in the United States.
Diversity
Did you know that the Creston Heights neighborhood has more Dutch and Finnish ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 6.6% of this neighborhood's residents have Dutch ancestry and 1.1% have Finnish 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 Creston Heights neighborhood in Grand Rapids are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 87.2% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 32.9% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 83.8% 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 Creston Heights neighborhood, 45.2% of the working population is employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is executive, management, and professional occupations, with 21.2% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations (18.8%), and 14.7% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
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 Creston Heights neighborhood is English, spoken by 94.1% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Polish and Spanish.
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 Creston Heights neighborhood in Grand Rapids, MI, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (10.0%). There are also a number of people of Sub-Saharan African ancestry (8.7%), and residents who report Irish roots (7.1%), and some of the residents are also of Dutch ancestry (6.6%), along with some Polish ancestry residents (4.7%), 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 Creston Heights neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (53.9% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (69.5%) 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 (17.7%) and 5.8% of residents also ride the bus 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.
