This is a small community in a single neighborhood.
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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.
War - Berwind is a very small town located in the state of West Virginia. With a population of 1,393 people and just one neighborhood, War - Berwind is the 126th largest community in West Virginia.
Occupations and Workforce
Because occupations involving physical labor dominate the local economy, War - Berwind is generally considered to be a blue-collar town. 43.10% of the War - Berwind workforce is employed in blue-collar occupations, compared to the national average of 27.7%. Overall, War - Berwind is a town of construction workers and builders, sales and office workers, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in War - Berwind who work in sales jobs (17.19%), law enforcement and fire fighting (11.86%), and office and administrative support (9.69%).
Setting & Lifestyle
The overall crime rate in War - Berwind is one of the lowest in the US. This makes it one of the safer places to live in the country in terms of crime.
It is a fairly quiet town because there are relatively few of those groups of people who have a tendency to be noisy. (Children, for example, often can't help themselves from being noisy, and being parents ourselves, we know!) War - Berwind has relatively few families with children living at home, and is quieter because of it. Renters and college students, for their own reasons, can also be noisy. War - Berwind has few renters and college students. But the biggest reason it is quieter in War - Berwind than in most places in America, is that there are just simply fewer people living here. If you think trees make good neighbors, War - Berwind may be for you.
One downside of living in War - Berwind, however, is that residents on average have to contend with a long commute, spending on average 39.84 minutes every day commuting to work.
As is often the case in a small town, War - Berwind doesn't have a public transportation system that people use for their commute.
Demographics
The population of War - Berwind has one of the lowest overall levels of education in the country: only 2.70% of people over 25 hold a college degree. The national average for all municipalities is 21.84%.
The per capita income in War - Berwind in 2022 was $17,944, which is low income relative to West Virginia and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $71,776 for a family of four. However, War - Berwind contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
The people who call War - Berwind home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of War - Berwind residents report their race to be White, followed by Native American. Important ancestries of people in War - Berwind include English, German, Irish, Slovak, and Czech.
The most common language spoken in War - Berwind is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Polish.
Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics
The way a neighborhood looks and feels when you walk or drive around it, from its setting, its buildings, and its flavor, can make all the difference. This neighborhood has some really cool things about the way it looks and feels as revealed by NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research. This might include anything from the housing stock to the types of households living here to how people get around.
People
The neighborhood is unique for having just 2.7% of adults here having earned a bachelor's degree. This is a lower rate of college graduates than NeighborhoodScout found in 98.5% of America's neighborhoods.
In addition, the neighborhood stands out for having an average per capita income lower than 97.5% of the neighborhoods in the United States. The neighborhood also has a greater percentage of children living in poverty (56.6%) than found in 96.2% 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.
Modes of Transportation
While most Americans do drive to work alone each day, the neighborhood stands out by having 90.6% of commuters doing so, which is a higher proportion of people driving alone to work than NeighborhoodScout found in 97.7% of all American neighborhoods.
Occupations
NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research identifies the neighborhood as having one of the highest concentrations of people employed in manufacturing or as laborers of any neighborhood in America. In fact, despite the loss of manufacturing jobs nationally, this neighborhood has 43.1% of its working residents employed in such fields, which is a higher proportion than 96.3% of American neighborhoods.
Real Estate
Uncrowded roads, rural America and space to be the individual you are. If you like these characteristics, this neighborhood may fit you. With just 18 residents per square mile, is less crowded than 95.2% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Slovak ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 1.8% of this neighborhood's residents have Slovak ancestry.
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 neighborhood in War - Berwind are low income, making it among the lowest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 97.5% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 56.6% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 96.2% 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 neighborhood, 43.1% of the working population is employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants, with 35.8% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (11.1%), and 9.9% in executive, management, and professional occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 98.1% of households. Some people also speak Italian (3.0%).
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 neighborhood in War - Berwind, WV, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as English (17.4%). There are also a number of people of German ancestry (13.8%), and residents who report Irish roots (9.0%), and some of the residents are also of Slovak ancestry (1.8%).
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 neighborhood spend between 45 minutes and one hour commuting one-way to work (50.6% of working residents), longer and tougher than most commutes in America.
Here most residents (90.6%) 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 (9.4%) . 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.
