This is a small community in a single neighborhood.
As throughout the site, some neighborhood-level data are reserved for subscribers.
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.
Vandalia is a tiny village located in the state of Michigan. With a population of 325 people and just one neighborhood, Vandalia is the 618th largest community in Michigan. Vandalia has an unusually large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic villages.
Vandalia real estate is some of the most expensive in Michigan, although Vandalia house values don't compare to the most expensive real estate in the U.S.
Occupations and Workforce
Vandalia is a blue-collar town, with 54.93% of people working in blue-collar occupations, while the average in America is just 27.7%. Overall, Vandalia is a village of sales and office workers, production and manufacturing workers, and construction workers and builders. There are especially a lot of people living in Vandalia who work in sales jobs (13.38%), office and administrative support (10.56%), and management occupations (6.34%).
Setting & Lifestyle
The village is relatively quiet, having a combination of lower population density and few of those groups of people who have a tendency to be noisy. For example, Vandalia has relatively fewer families with younger children, and/or college students. Combined, this makes Vandalia a pretty quiet place to live overall. If you like quiet, you will probably enjoy it here.
In Vandalia, however, the average commute to work is quite long. On average, people spend 31.16 minutes each day getting to work, which is significantly higher than the national average.
As is often the case in a small village, Vandalia doesn't have a public transportation system that people use for their commute.
Demographics
The population of Vandalia has a very low overall level of education: only 6.53% of people over 25 hold a 4-year college degree or higher.
The per capita income in Vandalia in 2022 was $24,466, which is low income relative to Michigan and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $97,864 for a family of four. However, Vandalia contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
Vandalia is an extremely ethnically-diverse village. The people who call Vandalia home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Vandalia residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Important ancestries of people in Vandalia include German, Irish, European, Swedish, and Italian.
The most common language spoken in Vandalia is English. Other important languages spoken here include Polish and Laotian.
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.
Real Estate
Despite all of the residential real estate here in the neighborhood, NeighborhoodScout has discovered that much of it is vacant. In resort or second-home vacation areas, this naturally occurs because homes and apartments are seasonally occupied, and empty for a portion of the year. In non-vacation or resort areas, however, this can be an indicator of property abandonment or a weak real estate market. The vacancy rate here is 34.5%, which is higher than 96.6% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
People
If you're nearing retirement age, or in retirement, the is an excellent choice for you to consider for top-quality retirement living. This neighborhood is rated by NeighborhoodScout as among the top 6.2% of retiree-friendly neighborhoods in Michigan, combining peace and quiet, safety from crime, and offering diverse housing options from which retirees can choose. Maybe it's because of these amenities that a large proportion of the residents here are college educated seniors, mixed with other age groups. For these and other reasons, NeighborhoodScout identifies this neighborhood as a top-notch place to consider if you are thinking of or planning to retire in Michigan.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Danish and Belgian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 3.6% of this neighborhood's residents have Danish ancestry and 0.7% have Belgian ancestry.
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 neighborhood in Vandalia are upper-middle income, making it an above average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 64.8% of the neighborhoods in America. With 14.4% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 59.8% 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 neighborhood, 35.7% 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 34.9% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (19.7%), and 9.2% in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations.
Languages
The most common language spoken in the neighborhood is English, spoken by 97.9% of households. Some people also speak Polish (5.1%).
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 neighborhood in Vandalia, MI, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (18.2%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (12.6%), and residents who report Irish roots (9.7%), and some of the residents are also of Mexican ancestry (7.7%), along with some Danish ancestry residents (3.6%), 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 neighborhood spend between 15 and 30 minutes commuting one-way to work (39.9% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (83.2%) 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 (9.0%) . 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.
