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.
Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake median real estate price is $515,065, which is less expensive than 81.1% of California neighborhoods and 32.1% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
The average rental price in Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake is currently $3,295, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. Rents here are currently lower in price than 46.6% of California neighborhoods.
Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake is a suburban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Salinas, California.
Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake 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 Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood are established but not old, having been built between 1970 and 1999. A number of residences were also built between 1940 and 1969.
In Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake, the current vacancy rate is 1.1%, which is a lower rate of vacancies than 91.1% of all neighborhoods in the U.S. This means that the housing supply in Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake 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 Salinas, the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Occupations
It used to be that most Americans lived on the farm, or otherwise made their living from the land, the forests, or the sea. With global trade and an economy increasingly based on providing services to one another, fewer people farm, fish or harvest timber now than at any time in American history. But according to NeighborhoodScout's leading analysis, the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood stands apart from most American neighborhood due to the proportion of its residents still working in these fields. With 21.5% of the workforce so employed, this neighborhood has a greater concentration of such workers than 99.7% of U.S. neighborhoods.
People
NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research revealed that 93.8% of the adult residents in the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood do not have a 4-year college degree, which is a lower rate of college graduated adults than found in 96.1% of the neighborhoods in America.
In addition, there is an especially high percentage of incarcerated people (0.8%) living in the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood.
Real Estate
Most neighborhoods are composed of a mixture of ages of homes, but the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake stands out as rather unique in having nearly all of its residential real estate built in one time period, namely between 1970 and 1999, generally considered to be established, but not old housing. What you'll sense when you look around or drive the streets of this neighborhood is that many of the residences look the same because of this similarity of age. In fact, 80.3% of the residential real estate here was built in this one time period.
Diversity
Did you know that the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood has more Mexican and Yugoslav ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 85.6% of this neighborhood's residents have Mexican ancestry and 0.4% have Yugoslav ancestry.
Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 82.0% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Spanish at home. This is a higher percentage than 98.8% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
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 Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood in Salinas are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 68.5% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 37.7% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 87.6% of U.S. neighborhoods.
What we choose to do for a living reflects who we are. Each neighborhood has a different mix of occupations represented, and together these tell you about the neighborhood and help you understand if this neighborhood may fit your lifestyle.
In the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood, 28.2% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is farming, forestry, or commercial fishing, with 21.5% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (21.2%), and 18.0% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood is Spanish, spoken by 82.0% of households. Some people also speak English (16.7%).
Ethnicity / Ancestry
Boston's Beacon Hill blue-blood streets, Brooklyn's Orthodox Jewish enclaves, Los Angeles' Persian neighborhoods. Each has its own culture derived primarily from the ancestries and culture of the residents who call these neighborhoods home. Likewise, each neighborhood in America has its own culture – some more unique than others – based on lifestyle, occupations, the types of households – and importantly – on the ethnicities and ancestries of the people who live in the neighborhood. Understanding where people came from, who their grandparents or great-grandparents were, can help you understand how a neighborhood is today.
In the Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood in Salinas, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Mexican (85.6%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (3.6%), and residents who report Irish roots (2.2%), and some of the residents are also of Asian ancestry (2.0%), along with some German ancestry residents (1.6%), among others. In addition, 38.8% 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 Laurel Heights / Sherwood Lake neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (47.0% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (77.3%) 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 (18.9%) . 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.
