Chinatown median real estate price is $2,545,260, which is more expensive than 95.3% of the neighborhoods in California and 99.2% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Chinatown is currently $1,155, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. Rents here are currently lower in price than 99.5% of California neighborhoods.
Chinatown is a densely urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in San Francisco, California.
Chinatown 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 single-family homes. Most of the residential real estate is renter occupied. Many of the residences in the Chinatown 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 1940 and 1969.
Home and apartment vacancy rates are 8.3% in Chinatown. NeighborhoodScout analysis shows that this rate is lower than 46.3% of the neighborhoods in the nation, approximately near the middle range for vacancies.
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 San Francisco, the Chinatown neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Real Estate
What you'll find when you visit or move to this neighborhood is one of the most crowded neighborhoods in all of America. With an incredible 149,293 people per square mile, it is more densely populated than 99.9% of America's neighborhoods. Even if you drive or take transit to your place of employment, many people enjoy being able to walk in their neighborhood. What many people don't realize is that most of America's premier vacation locations are also very walkable. The Chinatown neighborhood is among the top 5% of American neighborhoods in terms of walkability.
In addition, the real estate in the Chinatown 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, 93.7% of the real estate here is classified as apartment complexes or high-rise apartments, which is more than is found in 98.8% of American neighborhoods.
Furthermore, renter-occupied real estate is dominant in the Chinatown neighborhood. The percentage of rental real estate here, according to exclusive NeighborhoodScout analysis, is 90.0%, which is higher than 96.8% 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.
Also of note, the Chinatown 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 83.4% 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.
Finally, if you find historic homes and neighborhoods attractive, you love the details, the history, and the charm, then you are sure to be interested in this neighborhood. With 67.1% of the residential real estate in the Chinatown neighborhood built no later than 1939, and some built considerably earlier, this neighborhood has a greater concentration of historic residences than 98.1% of all neighborhoods in America. In this regard, this neighborhood truly stands out as special.
Modes of Transportation
In the Chinatown neighborhood, walking to work is a real option for many. In fact, NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research reveals walking to and from work is the chosen way to commute for 45.6% of residents here. This is a higher proportion of walking commuters than we found in 99.7% of American neighborhoods. Get ready to put on your walking shoes if you move here!
Also, our research revealed that more commuters here take the bus to work (18.3% ride the bus) than 98.2% of all American neighborhoods. If you like the idea of leaving your car and home and hopping the bus to work, this might be a good neighborhood for you to consider.
Car Ownership
American households most often have a car, and regularly they have two or three. But households in the Chinatown neighborhood buck this trend. 55.0% of the households in this neighborhood don't own a car at all. This is more carless households than NeighborhoodScout found in 99.0% of U.S. neighborhoods.
People
The Chinatown neighborhood stands out for having an average per capita income lower than 97.7% of the neighborhoods in the United States.
Occupations
Each year, fewer and fewer Americans make their living as farmers, foresters, or fishers. But the Chinatown neighborhood truly stands out among U.S. neighborhoods. According to exclusive NeighborhoodScout analysis, this neighborhood has a greater proportion of farmers, foresters, or fishers than 96.5% of all American neighborhoods. This is truly a unique cultural characteristic of this neighborhood.
Furthermore, there are more people living in the Chinatown neighborhood employed as sales and service workers (60.6%) 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.
Diversity
Did you know that the Chinatown neighborhood has more Asian and Native American ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 88.2% of this neighborhood's residents have Asian ancestry and 3.0% have Native American ancestry.
Chinatown is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 73.9% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Chinese at home. This is a higher percentage than 100.0% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
Migration / Stability
Do you like to be surrounded by people from all over the country or world, with different perspectives and life experiences? Or do you instead prefer to be in a neighborhood where most residents have lived there for a long time, creating a sense of cohesiveness? NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals that this neighborhood stands out among American neighborhoods for the uniqueness of the mobility of its residents. What is interesting to note, is that the Chinatown neighborhood has a greater percentage of residents born in another country (74.5%) than are found in 99.9% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
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 Chinatown neighborhood in San Francisco are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 97.7% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 26.4% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 77.3% 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 Chinatown neighborhood, 39.4% 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 35.6% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (15.1%), and 5.3% in manufacturing and laborer 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 Chinatown neighborhood is Chinese, spoken by 73.9% of households. Other important languages spoken here include English 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 Chinatown neighborhood in San Francisco, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Asian (88.2%). There are also a number of people of Mexican ancestry (3.3%), and residents who report Native American roots (3.0%), and some of the residents are also of Sub-Saharan African ancestry (2.9%), along with some African ancestry residents (2.9%), among others. In addition, 74.5% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.
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 Chinatown neighborhood spend between 30 and 45 minutes commuting one-way to work (35.1% of working residents), which is at or a bit above the average length of a commute across all U.S. neighborhoods.
Here most residents (45.6%) hop out the door and walk to work to get to work. In addition, quite a number also drive alone in a private automobile to get to work (21.8%) and 18.3% of residents also ride the bus for their daily commute. This is a special neighborhood for the number of people who walk to work. Combining exercise, low cost, and reduced pollution, plus the chance to see your neighbors, walking to work is fairly uncommon in America but likely to increase as people try to reduce their dependence on automobiles, and this neighborhood offers that opportunity today.
