How Are Neighbourhood Design Features Valued Across Different Neighbourhood Types?

Publication Date

January 2008

Author(s)

Roberto G. Quercia, Yan Song

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Researchers examine whether implicit prices of neighborhood design features in the housing market vary significantly across traditional, neo-traditional and conventional suburban neighborhood type They find that traditional design features are valued more in the traditional and neo-traditional neighborhoods and conventional neighborhood features are valued more in the suburban neighborhoods.

In this paper, we examine whether implicit prices of neighborhood design features in the housing market vary significantly across traditional, neo-traditional and conventional suburban neighborhood types. The set of neighborhood design features we examine here include neighborhood development density, street network connectivity, pedestrian access to transit and commercial stores, and land use mixture.

Using data from Washington County, Oregon, we first use statistical procedures to identify distinct  neighborhood types. We then employ hedonic price analyses and a series of spatial Chow tests to obtain implicit prices of design attributes for houses in each neighborhood type.

We find that traditional design features, such as higher street network connectivity and better pedestrian access to transit and commercial stores, are valued more in the traditional and neo-traditional neighborhoods, and that conventional neighborhood features, such as lower housing density and higher degree of homogeneous land uses, are valued more in the suburban neighborhoods.