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.
Kakaako median real estate price is $1,139,736, which is more expensive than 60.1% of the neighborhoods in Hawaii and 92.6% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Kakaako is currently $3,913, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. The average rental cost in this neighborhood is higher than 65.2% of the neighborhoods in Hawaii.
Kakaako is a densely urban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Kakaako 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 occupied by a mixture of owners and renters. Many of the residences in the Kakaako neighborhood are newer, built in 2000 or more recently. A number of residences were also built between 1970 and 1999.
Vacant apartments or homes are a major fact of life in Kakaako. The current real estate vacancy rate here is 23.5%. This is higher than the rate of vacancies in 91.3% of all U.S. neighborhoods. A relatively large percentage of housing here is seasonally occupied (16.4%). This can occur in vacation areas, and occasionally it is also found in neighborhoods that are primarily filled with college students, as some apartments could be vacant when school is not in session. If you live here year round, you may find that a number of buildings in your neighborhood are actually empty.
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 Honolulu, the Kakaako neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
Real Estate
The real estate in the Kakaako 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, 92.7% of the real estate here is classified as apartment complexes or high-rise apartments, which is more than is found in 98.6% of American neighborhoods.
In addition, the Kakaako neighborhood is very densely populated compared to most U.S. neighborhoods. In fact, with 38,402 persons per square mile in the neighborhood, it is more packed with people than 97.8% of the nation's neighborhoods.
Furthermore, if you like the look and ambience of new homes and newly built neighborhoods, you will love the Kakaako neighborhood. A whopping 68.5% of the homes and other residential real estate here were built after 1999, which is a higher proportion of new homes then you will find in 95.2% of the neighborhoods in the U.S. Everything here just feels new.
Modes of Transportation
In the Kakaako neighborhood, carpooling is still a popular way to get to and from work. NeighborhoodScout's analysis reveals that 23.9% of commuters carpool here, which is more than in 96.3% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
Also, more people in Kakaako choose to walk to work each day (12.4%) than almost any neighborhood in America. If you are attracted to the idea of being able to walk to work, this neighborhood could be a good choice.
Diversity
Did you know that the Kakaako neighborhood has more Asian and Ukrainian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 67.8% of this neighborhood's residents have Asian ancestry and 3.0% have Ukrainian ancestry.
Kakaako is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 13.1% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Japanese at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 100.0% of the neighborhoods in America.
Migration / Stability
Some neighborhoods have more internal cohesiveness than others. While other neighborhoods feel like a collection of strangers who just happen to live near each other. Sometimes this comes down to not only the personalities of the people in a place, but how long people have been together in that neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research has revealed some interesting things about the rootedness of people in the Kakaako neighborhood. What is interesting to note, is that the Kakaako neighborhood has a greater percentage of residents born in another country (45.2%) than are found in 96.1% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
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 Kakaako neighborhood in Honolulu are upper-middle income, making it an above average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 73.9% of the neighborhoods in America. With 33.3% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 84.7% 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 Kakaako neighborhood, 51.1% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is manufacturing and laborer occupations, with 19.4% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (15.1%), and 14.4% in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants.
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 Kakaako neighborhood is English, spoken by 58.2% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Japanese, Korean, Chinese and German/Yiddish.
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 Kakaako neighborhood in Honolulu, HI, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Asian (67.8%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (5.4%), and residents who report Ukrainian roots (3.0%), and some of the residents are also of Italian ancestry (2.7%), along with some German ancestry residents (2.5%), among others. In addition, 45.2% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.
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 Kakaako neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (48.9% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (49.7%) 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 (23.9%) and 12.4% of residents also hop out the door and walk to work 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.
