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.
Lancaster is a somewhat small town located in the state of Massachusetts. With a population of 8,394 people and just one neighborhood, Lancaster is the 199th largest community in Massachusetts.
Housing costs in Lancaster are among some of the highest in the nation, although real estate prices here don't compare to real estate prices in the most expensive communities in Massachusetts.
Occupations and Workforce
Unlike some towns, Lancaster isn’t mainly white- or blue-collar. Instead, the most prevalent occupations for people in Lancaster are a mix of both white- and blue-collar jobs. Overall, Lancaster is a town of professionals, managers, and sales and office workers. There are especially a lot of people living in Lancaster who work in management occupations (12.29%), teaching (9.72%), and office and administrative support (9.34%).
Also of interest is that Lancaster has more people living here who work in computers and math than 95% of the places in the US.
One interesting thing about the economy is that relatively large numbers of people worked from their home: 32.87% of the workforce. While this number may seem small overall, as a fraction of the total workforce this is high compared to the rest of the county. These workers are often telecommuters who work in knowledge-based, white-collar professions. For example, Silicon Valley has large numbers of people who telecommute. Other at-home workers may be self-employed people who operate small businesses out of their homes.
Setting & Lifestyle
Lancaster is a good choice for families with children because of several factors. Many other families with children live here, making it a place where both parents and children are more likely to develop social ties with other families. The town’s good public school district and large population of college-educated adults provide an environment conducive to academic success. Many people own their own single-family homes, providing areas for children to play and stability in the community. Finally, Lancaster’s overall crime rate is lower than average for the country.
Demographics
Do you like to read, write and learn? If you move to Lancaster, you'll likely find that many of your neighbors like to as well. Lancaster is one of the more educated communities in America, with a full 51.11% of its adults having a college degree or even advanced degree, compared to a national average across all communities of 21.84%.
The per capita income in Lancaster in 2022 was $47,608, which is lower middle income relative to Massachusetts, and wealthy relative to the rest of the US. This equates to an annual income of $190,432 for a family of four.
Lancaster is a somewhat ethnically-diverse town. The people who call Lancaster home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Lancaster residents report their race to be White, followed by Black or African-American. Important ancestries of people in Lancaster include Irish, English, Italian, French, and German.
The most common language spoken in Lancaster is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Portuguese.
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
Of particular note, 16.8% of the people in the neighborhood currently reside in a correction facility, held due to punishment for a crime.
In addition, if you're planning where to retire, the neighborhood in Lancaster is a great option to consider. According to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive retirement dream area analysis, it's peaceful and quiet, has above average safety ratings compared to other neighborhoods in MA, offers a wide range of housing options, and has already attracted an enviable mix of college educated seniors. This neighborhood ranks as better for retirement living than 89.8% of the neighborhoods in Massachusetts. If you are considering retiring to Massachusetts, this is a good neighborhood to look at. In addition to being an excellent choice for active retirees, this neighborhood is also a very good choice for urban sophisticates.
Modes of Transportation
A unique way of commuting is simply not to. And in the neighborhood, analysis shows that 32.9% of the residents work from home, avoiding a commute altogether. This may not seem like a large number, but it is a higher proportion of people working from home than is found in 98.1% of the neighborhoods in the United States. One thing NeighborhoodScout's research reveals is that the wealthier and/or more isolated the neighborhood, the greater the proportion of residents who choose to work from home.
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Canadian and Brazilian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 3.0% of this neighborhood's residents have Canadian ancestry and 3.1% have Brazilian ancestry.
is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 3.9% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Portuguese at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 99.0% 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 neighborhood in Lancaster are upper-middle income, making it an above average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 82.4% of the neighborhoods in America. In addition, 3.3% 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 70.5% of America'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, 57.6% 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 18.3% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants (14.3%), and 9.8% in clerical, assistant, and tech support 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 neighborhood is English, spoken by 87.6% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Portuguese.
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 neighborhood in Lancaster, MA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Irish (13.0%). There are also a number of people of English ancestry (12.4%), and residents who report Italian roots (10.2%), and some of the residents are also of French ancestry (7.5%), along with some German ancestry residents (6.9%), 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 (30.4% of working residents), which is shorter than the time spent commuting to work for most Americans.
Here most residents (56.8%) 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 (7.9%) . 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.
