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.
Morro Hills median real estate price is $1,294,537, which is more expensive than 75.7% of the neighborhoods in California and 94.7% of the neighborhoods in the U.S.
The average rental price in Morro Hills is currently $5,531, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. The average rental cost in this neighborhood is higher than 93.4% of the neighborhoods in California.
Morro Hills is a rural neighborhood (based on population density) located in Oceanside, California.
Morro Hills real estate is primarily made up of medium sized (three or four bedroom) to large (four, five or more bedroom) single-family homes and apartment complexes/high-rise apartments. Most of the residential real estate is owner occupied. Many of the residences in the Morro Hills neighborhood are newer, built in 2000 or more recently. A number of residences were also built between 1970 and 1999.
Morro Hills has a 10.4% vacancy rate, which is well above average compared to other U.S. neighborhoods (higher than 63.3% of American neighborhoods). A relatively large percentage of housing here is seasonally occupied (8.3%), which can occur in some markets dominated by colleges or vacation homes. If you live here year round, you will find many of the homes or apartments are empty for all or a portion of the year.
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
A majority of the adults in the Morro Hills neighborhood are wealthy and educated executives. They own stately homes that tend to maintain high real estate appreciation rates. Their upper-level careers keep them busy, but allow them to live comfortably. If you're an executive and want to keep similar company, consider settling in this neighborhood, rated as an executive lifestyle "best choice" neighborhood for California by NeighborhoodScout's analysis, which rated it as better for executive lifestyles than 98.6% of the neighborhoods in California. In addition to being an excellent choice for highly educated executives, this neighborhood is also a very good choice for urban sophisticates and families with school-aged children.
In addition, if you come to know the people here, you will recognize that you're in the company of one of the wealthiest communities in the nation. In fact, a mere 4.2% of America's neighborhoods are wealthier than the Morro Hills neighborhood. Real estate here is exceedingly well-maintained, and similarly, tends to maintain its value over time. The cars driven are mostly luxury brands like Mercedes, Audi, BMW, and Lexus. If the public schools aren't up to snuff, the residents of this neighborhood preferentially send their children to private preparatory schools. Vacation to Disney? Yes, but equally popular are summers in Europe.
Occupations
With 3.1% of employed workers living in the Morro Hills neighborhood active in the military, this neighborhood has the distinction of having a higher proportion of people in the military than 97.7% of American neighborhoods. This is a major shaper of the neighborhood's culture and character.
Real Estate
If you like the look and ambience of new homes and newly built neighborhoods, you will love the Morro Hills neighborhood. A whopping 69.9% 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 95.8% of the neighborhoods in the U.S. Everything here just feels new.
In addition, one way that the Morro Hills neighborhood really stands out, is that it has more large 4, 5, or additional bedroom homes and real estate than 95.4% of the neighborhoods in America. When you walk or drive around this neighborhood, you'll instantly notice the size of the homes here which definitely makes a strong visual statement.
Diversity
Did you know that the Morro Hills neighborhood has more Iranian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 1.1% of this neighborhood's residents have Iranian ancestry.
Morro Hills is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 1.9% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak German/Yiddish at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 96.1% of the neighborhoods in America.
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 Morro Hills neighborhood in Oceanside are wealthy, making it among the 15% highest income neighborhoods in America. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 95.8% of the neighborhoods in America. In addition, 1.0% of the children seventeen and under living in this neighborhood are living below the federal poverty line, which is a lower rate of childhood poverty than is found in 78.7% of America'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 Morro Hills neighborhood, 56.4% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional 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 24.9% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in manufacturing and laborer occupations (11.3%), and 6.6% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the Morro Hills neighborhood is English, spoken by 84.6% of households. Some people also speak Spanish (6.7%).
Ethnicity / Ancestry
Culture is the shared learned behavior of peoples. Undeniably, different ethnicities and ancestries have different cultural traditions, and as a result, neighborhoods with concentrations of residents of one or another ethnicities or ancestries will express those cultures. It is what makes the North End in Boston so fun to visit for the Italian restaurants, bakeries, culture, and charm, and similarly, why people enjoy visiting Chinatown in San Francisco.
In the Morro Hills neighborhood in Oceanside, CA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as English (16.5%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (10.1%), and residents who report Mexican roots (8.7%), and some of the residents are also of German ancestry (7.6%), along with some Asian ancestry residents (4.3%), among others. In addition, 10.7% 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 Morro Hills neighborhood spend between 45 minutes and one hour commuting one-way to work (36.7% of working residents), longer and tougher than most commutes in America.
Here most residents (82.7%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. 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.
