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.
Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch median real estate price is $975,103, which is more expensive than 57.9% of the neighborhoods in California and 89.7% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch is currently $2,703, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. Rents here are currently lower in price than 72.3% of California neighborhoods.
Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch is an urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in La Mesa, California.
Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch real estate is primarily made up of small (studio to two bedroom) to medium sized (three or four bedroom) single-family homes and apartment complexes/high-rise apartments. Most of the residential real estate is occupied by a mixture of owners and renters. Many of the residences in the Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood are older, well-established, built between 1940 and 1969. A number of residences were also built between 1970 and 1999.
In Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch, the current vacancy rate is 0.0%, which is a lower rate of vacancies than 100.0% of all neighborhoods in the U.S. This means that the housing supply in Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch is very tight compared to the demand for property here.
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 La Mesa, the Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Real Estate
With a real estate vacancy rate of only 0.0%, the Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood has a lower vacancy rate than 100.0% of U.S. neighborhoods, a very elite group. Such a low vacancy rate may indicate very strong real estate demand in the neighborhood combined with some impediments to increasing supply, such as zoning or existing density of development, among other potential reasons.
People
Of note is NeighborhoodScout's research finding that the Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch 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 Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch community truly stands out from the rest in this regard.
In addition, the Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood stands out within California for its college student friendly environment. NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals that this neighborhood is home to a number of college students, is relatively walkable, and above average in safety. In combination, this makes it stand out for a good place for college students to consider. Because a number of college students live here, this neighborhood may be close to a college campus and offer certain amenities nearby geared towards the student body. While it's not an environment for everyone, ambitious scholars can enjoy seasonal excitement between semesters and school breaks, and parents can rest easy knowing that the area has an above average safety rating. For each of these reasons, the neighborhood is rated among the top 7.1% of college-friendly places to live in CA.
Occupations
The Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood stands out nationally for having a greater proportion of its residents active in the military than 98.2% 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.
Diversity
Did you know that the Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood has more Swiss and Scottish ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 1.5% of this neighborhood's residents have Swiss ancestry and 4.8% have Scottish ancestry.
Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 1.4% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Greek at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 98.1% 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 Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood in La Mesa are middle-income, making it a moderate income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 46.6% 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.
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 Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood, 48.5% 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 18.4% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (17.8%), and 15.4% 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 Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood is English, spoken by 78.0% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Italian.
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 Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood in La Mesa, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Mexican (18.3%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (14.4%), and residents who report German roots (13.7%), and some of the residents are also of Irish ancestry (7.8%), along with some Scottish ancestry residents (4.8%), 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 Porter Hill Terrace / Crouch neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (41.5% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (78.4%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also hop out the door and walk to work to get to work (7.0%) . 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.
