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.
West Reading is a very small borough located in the state of Pennsylvania. With a population of 4,543 people and just one neighborhood, West Reading is the 336th largest community in Pennsylvania. West Reading has a large stock of pre-World War II architecture, making it one of the older and more historic boroughs in the country.
Occupations and Workforce
West Reading is neither predominantly blue-collar nor white-collar, instead having a mixed workforce of both blue-collar and white-collar jobs. Overall, West Reading is a borough of professionals, sales and office workers, and service providers. There are especially a lot of people living in West Reading who work in office and administrative support (14.60%), healthcare (14.16%), and teaching (7.28%).
One interesting thing about the economy is that relatively large numbers of people worked from their home: 7.95% 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
Demographics
The overall education level of West Reading citizens is substantially higher than the typical US community, as 33.34% of adults in West Reading have at least a bachelor's degree, and the average American community has 21.84%.
The per capita income in West Reading in 2022 was $49,106, which is wealthy relative to Pennsylvania and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $196,424 for a family of four. However, West Reading contains both very wealthy and poor people as well.
West Reading is an extremely ethnically-diverse borough. The people who call West Reading home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of West Reading residents report their race to be White, followed by Asian. West Reading also has a sizeable Hispanic population (people of Hispanic origin can be of any race). People of Hispanic or Latino origin account for 32.53% of the borough’s residents. Important ancestries of people in West Reading include German, Italian, Irish, English, and Polish.
The most common language spoken in West Reading is English. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Polish.
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
For many reasons, is rated by NeighborhoodScout as one of the top 0.4% of ideal neighborhoods for first-time home buyers in the state of Pennsylvania. Homes here are priced below median housing values in the state, yet the neighborhood has a track record according to NeighborhoodScout's exclusive neighborhood home appreciation rates of above average real estate appreciation over the last five years compared to other PA neighborhoods, protecting your investment in your first home, while simultaneously making it less risky for your lender. Not only does this neighborhood stand out for combining price and home value stability or increases, it also is a neighborhood with a high quality resident population according exclusive data, meaning this is likely a good place to buy, live, and enjoy. While many first time home buyers focus purely on low cost and convenient location, which can risk your investment in your first home and put you in a less than desirable neighborhood, this neighborhood is a true standout for a lot of reasons, and definitely worth a look if you are a first time home buyer.
Real Estate
If you love row houses and attached homes, you will probably really like the neighborhood. The ambiance, the charm, of row houses is something special. And in sheer abundance of row houses, this neighborhood truly stands out. The real estate here has a higher proportion of row houses and attached homes than nearly any neighborhood in America. In fact, 65.0% of the residential real estate here is classified as row houses and attached homes.
In addition, do you watch 'This Old House' on Public Television? Do you love the idea of fixing up a Colonial or Victorian era home, complete with the charm of yesteryear? Do you like to stroll or drive streets lined with gracious older residences? If you found yourself nodding yes to any of these questions, you are going to be interested in this unique neighborhood. The neighborhood stands out on a national scale for the sheer concentration of historic residences it contains: 55.3% of the residential real estate here was built from 1939 or earlier, some much earlier. This is a greater concentration of historic homes than 95.4% of the neighborhoods in the United States.
Modes of Transportation
In the neighborhood, walking to work is a real option for many. In fact, NeighborhoodScout's exclusive research reveals walking to and from work is the chosen way to commute for 10.8% of residents here. This is a higher proportion of walking commuters than we found in 95.4% of American neighborhoods. Get ready to put on your walking shoes if you move here!
Diversity
Did you know that the neighborhood has more Puerto Rican and Czechoslovakian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 21.8% of this neighborhood's residents have Puerto Rican ancestry and 1.1% have Czechoslovakian 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 West Reading are lower-middle income, making it a below average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's research shows that this neighborhood has an income lower than 67.3% of U.S. neighborhoods. With 14.6% of the children here below the federal poverty line, this neighborhood has a higher rate of childhood poverty than 60.3% 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, 41.1% 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 23.1% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (18.4%), and 17.4% 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 neighborhood is English, spoken by 70.4% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish and Polish.
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 West Reading, PA, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as Puerto Rican (21.8%). There are also a number of people of German ancestry (20.0%), and residents who report Italian roots (10.9%), and some of the residents are also of Irish ancestry (10.7%), along with some Asian ancestry residents (6.6%), 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 under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (46.1% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (79.6%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also hop out the door and walk to work to get to work (10.8%) . 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.
