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.
Franconia East median real estate price is $485,396, which is more expensive than 58.2% of the neighborhoods in Virginia and 63.7% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Franconia East is currently $3,435, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. The average rental cost in this neighborhood is higher than 83.7% of the neighborhoods in Virginia.
Franconia East is an urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Alexandria, Virginia.
Franconia East 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 townhomes. Most of the residential real estate is occupied by a mixture of owners and renters. Many of the residences in the Franconia East neighborhood are established but not old, having been built between 1970 and 1999. A number of residences were also built between 2000 and the present.
Real estate vacancies in Franconia East are 3.4%, which is lower than one will find in 76.4% of American neighborhoods. Demand for real estate in Franconia East is above average for the U.S., and may signal some demand for either price increases or new construction of residential product for this neighborhood.
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 Alexandria, the Franconia East neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
People
Of note is NeighborhoodScout's research finding that the Franconia East neighborhood has some of the lowest rates of children living in poverty of any neighborhood in the United States. In a nation where approximately 1 in 4 children are living in poverty, the Franconia East community truly stands out from the rest in this regard.
Occupations
The Franconia East neighborhood stands out nationally for having a greater proportion of its residents active in the military than 99.0% of other U.S. neighborhoods. If you come here, you will notice military people active in their jobs, going to and from work, and in plain clothes out and about the neighborhood.
Furthermore, the government often provides some of the more stable jobs in the economy. From local, to state, to federal government workers, the government can also be a major employer. What NeighborhoodScout's analysis revealed, is that the Franconia East neighborhood in particular stands out when compared nationally for the proportion of its working residents who are employed by the government. At 17.9% of its workforce, this neighborhood has a greater concentration of government workers than 98.5% of U.S. neighborhoods.
Real Estate
The Franconia East neighborhood is very unique in that it has one of the highest proportions of one, two, or no bedroom real estate of any neighborhood in America. Most neighborhoods have a mixture of home or apartment sizes from small to large, but here the concentration of studios and other small living spaces is at near-record heights. With 90.3% of the real estate here of this small size, this most assuredly is a notable feature that makes this neighborhood unique, along with just a handful of other neighborhoods in the U.S. that share this characteristic.
In addition, the real estate in the Franconia East neighborhood really stands out in the way it looks for a unique reason: this neighborhood has a higher proportion of apartment complexes or high-rise apartments than nearly every neighborhood in the country. Most neighborhoods are a mixture of real estate and housing types, but here it is almost entirely dominated by big apartment buildings and complexes. In fact, 78.6% of the real estate here is classified as apartment complexes or high-rise apartments, which is more than is found in 96.5% of American neighborhoods.
Modes of Transportation
In the Franconia East neighborhood, 12.6% of people ride the train to work each day. This is a very high percentage compared to most places. In fact, NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals that this is a higher level of train ridership than in 96.1% of the neighborhoods in America.
Diversity
Significantly, 3.6% 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 98.2% of the neighborhoods in America.
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 Franconia East neighborhood in Alexandria 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 88.8% of the neighborhoods in America. In addition, 0.0% 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 100.0% 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 Franconia East neighborhood, 69.5% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is government jobs, whether they are in local, state, or federal positions, with 17.9% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (14.8%), and 12.4% 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 Franconia East neighborhood is English, spoken by 76.1% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish, Vietnamese, Korean and African languages.
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 Franconia East neighborhood in Alexandria, VA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Asian (11.2%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (7.9%), and residents who report English roots (7.7%), and some of the residents are also of Italian ancestry (7.3%), along with some Polish ancestry residents (6.7%), among others. In addition, 15.3% 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 Franconia East neighborhood spend between 30 and 45 minutes commuting one-way to work (43.2% of working residents), which is at or a bit above the average length of a commute across all U.S. neighborhoods.
Here most residents (57.7%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also take the train to get to work (12.6%) . 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.
