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.
Armour Square South median real estate price is $355,101, which is more expensive than 62.1% of the neighborhoods in Illinois and 47.7% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Armour Square South is currently $1,045, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. Rents here are currently lower in price than 94.0% of Illinois neighborhoods.
Armour Square South is an urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Chicago, Illinois.
Armour Square South 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 renter occupied. Many of the residences in the Armour Square South neighborhood are older, well-established, built between 1940 and 1969. A number of residences were also built between 1970 and 1999.
Real estate vacancies in Armour Square South are 3.1%, which is lower than one will find in 79.7% of American neighborhoods. Demand for real estate in Armour Square South 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 Chicago, the Armour Square South neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
People
One of the unique characteristics of the Armour Square South neighborhood revealed by analysis is that the per capita income of residents here is lower than that found in 99.4% of the neighborhoods in America. The Armour Square South neighborhood also has a greater percentage of children living in poverty (77.5%) than found in 99.2% of all U.S. neighborhoods. Children living in poverty is one of the challenges facing America, and the world, and in this neighborhood in particular, the problem can be considered acute.
In addition, single parenting is hard. But you don't have to tell the Armour Square South neighborhood about it; they already know. 25.5% of this neighborhood's households are run by single mothers, which is a higher concentration than NeighborhoodScout found in 99.0% of American neighborhoods. Further NeighborhoodScout research showed strong statistical correlations among high rates of children living in single parent households, and neighborhood crime, particularly violent crime, neighborhood poverty, and, importantly, the percentage of low weight births and rates of infant mortality.
Also, neighborhoodScout's exclusive research revealed that 94.7% of the adult residents in the Armour Square South neighborhood do not have a 4-year college degree, which is a lower rate of college graduated adults than found in 96.9% of the neighborhoods in America.
Real Estate
Renter-occupied real estate is dominant in the Armour Square South neighborhood. The percentage of rental real estate here, according to exclusive NeighborhoodScout analysis, is 97.3%, which is higher than 98.5% of the neighborhoods in America. If you were to buy and live in the property you bought here, you would be almost alone in doing so.
Car Ownership
We Americans love our cars. Not only are they a necessity for most Americans due to the shape of our neighborhoods and the distances between where we live, work, shop, and go to school, but we also fancy them. As a result, most households in America have one, two, or three cars. But NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis shows that the Armour Square South neighborhood has a highly unusual pattern of car ownership. 38.0% of the households in this neighborhood don't own a car at all. This is more carless households than NeighborhoodScout found in 97.9% of U.S. neighborhoods.
Occupations
There are more people living in the Armour Square South neighborhood employed as sales and service workers (57.8%) 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.
Modes of Transportation
More people ride the bus in this neighborhood each day to get to work than 95.6% of U.S. neighborhoods.
Diversity
Significantly, 5.1% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Chinese at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 95.1% 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 Armour Square South neighborhood in Chicago are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 99.4% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 77.5% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 99.2% 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 Armour Square South neighborhood, 42.2% 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 23.4% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations (20.1%), and 14.3% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the Armour Square South neighborhood is English, spoken by 93.5% of households. Some people also speak Chinese (5.1%).
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 Armour Square South neighborhood in Chicago, IL, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (10.8%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (6.9%), and residents who report Asian roots (5.8%), and some of the residents are also of Polish ancestry (1.3%).
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 Armour Square South neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (37.8% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (50.7%) 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 (20.3%) and 11.3% 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.
