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.
Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue median real estate price is $116,411, which is less expensive than 97.1% of Maryland neighborhoods and 92.7% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
The average rental price in Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue is currently $1,208, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. Rents here are currently lower in price than 98.4% of Maryland neighborhoods.
Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue is a suburban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Cumberland, Maryland.
Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue real estate is primarily made up of medium sized (three or four bedroom) to small (studio to two 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 Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue 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.
Vacant apartments or homes are a major fact of life in Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue. The current real estate vacancy rate here is 17.4%. This is higher than the rate of vacancies in 82.7% of all U.S. neighborhoods. In addition, most vacant housing here is vacant year round. This can sometimes be the case in neighborhoods dominated by new construction that is not yet occupied. But often neighborhoods with vacancy rates this high are places that can be plagued by a protracted vacancy problem. If you live here, you may find that a number of buildings in your neighborhood are actually empty.
Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics
When you see a neighborhood for the first time, the most important thing is often the way it looks, like its homes and its setting. Some places look the same, but they only reveal their true character after living in them for a while because they contain a unique mix of occupational or cultural groups. This neighborhood is very unique in some important ways, according to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive exploration and analysis.
People
Astoundingly, the Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood has one of the highest concentrations of divorcees living here than of any neighborhood, a higher concentration than NeighborhoodScout found in 98.9% of U.S. neighborhoods. This may be because people living here divorce more often than others, or that divorced people move here after they become divorced. If you are divorced, you will be in good company in this particular Cumberland neighborhood.
Occupations
Each year, fewer and fewer Americans make their living as farmers, foresters, or fishers. But the Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue 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 96.8% of all American neighborhoods. This is truly a unique cultural characteristic of this neighborhood.
Length of Commute
Regardless of the means by which residents commute, this neighborhood has a length of commute that is notable. Residents of the Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood have the pleasure of having one of the shortest commutes to work of any neighborhood in America. 61.8% of the residents have a commute time from home to work (one way) of less than fifteen minutes. This is a higher proportion of residents enjoying a short trip to work than NeighborhoodScout found in 96.7% of U.S. neighborhoods. Less time commuting means more time for other things in life.
Diversity
Did you know that the Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood has more Yugoslav ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 0.3% of this neighborhood's residents have Yugoslav ancestry.
Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 8.7% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Italian at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 97.2% of the neighborhoods in America.
The Neighbors
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 Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood in Cumberland are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 93.4% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 44.8% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 91.7% of U.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 Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood, 29.4% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations, with 29.1% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (25.2%), and 11.5% 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 Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood is English, spoken by 95.7% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Italian and Polish.
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 Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood in Cumberland, MD, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (19.5%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (12.8%), and residents who report English roots (9.7%), and some of the residents are also of Italian ancestry (6.0%), along with some Polish ancestry residents (2.7%), among others.
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 Chapel Hill-Virginia Avenue neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (61.8% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (81.3%) 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 (6.1%) . 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.
