Home prices and Homicides

I know that all my high-paid-but-still-renting youngish engineer peeps want to live in the next hip neighborhood. The next cool neighborhood of 2004 was Echo Park, but, now, my friends, that ship has left Overcrowded Family Bay and is now half-way to Gentrification City.

Three things make a neighborhood the next-big-thing!

1. Cheap enough that gay couples can buy their first houses there and start remodeling.

2. Proximity to neighborhoods that were previously cool.

3. Not suicidally dangerous.

So, I've worked out the numbers and I declare the next big neighborhood to be. (Drum roll......) LA/El Sereno 90032.

It is the best compromise on price ($389k), homicide rate, and proximity to Downtown and Hollywood. (Admittedly a bit too far from the beach, which may hurt its future hipness quotient somewhat.)

But, alas, I'll be staying in LA/South Mid-City 90016, which I declare to be the next next-big-thing.

I've worked this out through a detailed analysis of morbid statistics. Using the map from the Homicide Report blog and the latest DQ News LA Times monthly chart, I've gathered some price vs homicide statistics for popular zip codes.

"Price" is the single family home price for November 2007 as reported by DQ News for the LA Times.
A "popular zip code" is one with 10 or more single-family homes sold in Nov 2007.
"Homicides" is the number of homicides within a 2 mile radius of the center of the Zip code as reported by the Homicide map, and not the number of homicides in the zip code itself.

Here are some fun, if depressing, facts.

Most expensive popular zip codes with 30+ homicides
LA/Hancock Park 90004: $981 vs 33
LA/Jefferson Park 90018: $470 vs 40

Least expensive popular zip codes with 30+ homicides
LA/Watts 90059: $270 vs 41
LA/South Central 90003: $361 vs 66

Most expensive popular zip codes with 20-29 homicides
LA/Mid-City 90019: $730 vs 29
LA/South Mid-City 90016: $555 vs 27

Least expensive popular zip codes with 20-29 homicides
Compton 90220: $350 vs 24
Lynwood 90262: $420 vs 22

Most expensive popular zip codes with 10-19 homicides
LA/Echo Park 90026 : $669 vs 19
Van Nuys 91401: $610 vs 13

Least expensive popular zip codes with 10-19 homicides
Paramount 90723: $354 vs 19
Long Beach 90805: $360 vs 16

Most expensive popular zip codes with 0-9 homicides
Beverly Hills 90210: $3455 vs 0
Santa Monica 90402: $2350 vs 2

Least expensive popular zip codes with 0-9 homicides
Palmdale 93591: $228 vs 3
Lancaster 93534: $210 vs 1

The whole table

LA/South Central 90003   $319    66
LA/Athens        90044   $425    62
LA/Watts         90002   $420    53
LA/South Central 90047   $400    44
LA/Watts         90059   $270    41
LA/Jefferson Park 90018  $470    40
Compton          90222   $365    38
LA/Hancock Park  90004   $981    33
Compton          90221   $395    31
LA/Mid-City      90019   $730    29
LA/View Park     90043   $533    27
Huntington Park  90255   $438    27
LA/South Mid-City 90016   $555    27
Compton          90220   $350    24
Lynwood          90262   $420    22
LA/Echo Park     90026   $669    19
Paramount        90723   $354    19
Hawthorne        90250   $488    17
Long Beach       90805   $360    16
Bellflower       90706   $400    16
Pomona           91766   $453    14
South Gate       90280   $410    14
Van Nuys         91405   $468    14
Carson           90746   $575    14
Van Nuys         91401   $610    13
LA/Glassell      90065   $525    13
LA/El Sereno     90032   $389    11
Carson           90745   $485    11
Pacoima          91331   $395    10
Pomona           91767   $385    10
Pasadena         91104   $725    9
Torrance         90501   $627    9
North Hills      91343   $485    9
Pico Rivera      90660   $438    9
La Puente        91744   $400    9
Pasadena         91103   $980    8
LA/Atwater Village 90039 $659    8
Downey           90240   $535    7
LA/Highland Park 90042   $500    7
Whittier         90606   $435    7
Downey           90242   $434    7
West Hwood /LA   90046   $1,050  6
LA/Mar Vista     90066   $693    6
Altadena         91001   $580    6
Downey           90241   $570    6
San Dimas        91773   $560    6
Monterey Park    91754   $514    6
West Covina      91790   $423    6
Glendale         91201   $674    5
Temple City      91780   $563    5
North Hollywood  91605   $527    5
Lakewood         90712   $504    5
Van Nuys         91406   $498    5
West Covina      91791   $480    5
Reseda           91335   $460    5
Rosemead         91770   $453    5
Norwalk          90650   $420    5
Baldwin Park     91706   $400    5
Venice           90291   $1,260  4
Torrance         90505   $745    4
Rowland Heights  91748   $629    4
Alhambra         91801   $575    4
Burbank          91505   $566    4
Torrance         90504   $540    4
Lakewood         90713   $438    4
Pomona           91768   $379    4
West Hwood /LA   90069   $1,700  3
LA/Rancho Park   90064   $1,590  3
Cerritos         90703   $620    3
Long Beach       90807   $600    3
Burbank          91506   $588    3
Long Beach       90808   $566    3
Hacienda Hghts   91745   $550    3
Whittier         90601   $545    3
Covina           91722   $431    3
Palmdale         93591   $228    3
Santa Monica     90402   $2,350  2
LA/West LA       90025   $1,055  2
Arcadia          91007   $1,015  2
Arcadia          91006   $771    2
Torrance         90503   $729    2
LA/Westchester   90045   $725    2
Granada Hills    91344   $620    2
Walnut           91789   $585    2
Diamond Bar      91765   $575    2
Burbank          91504   $565    2
San Gabriel      91776   $555    2
West Hills       91307   $533    2
Canoga Park      91304   $522    2
Monrovia         91016   $494    2
Manhattan Beach  90266   $1,835  1
Rancho P.V.      90275   $1,215  1
LA/Hollywood     90068   $1,185  1
Studio City      91604   $1,008  1
Glendora         91741   $740    1
Redondo Beach    90278   $730    1
Woodland Hills   91364   $656    1
Northridge       91326   $611    1
Whittier         90605   $486    1
Whittier         90604   $485    1
La Mirada        90638   $475    1
Winnetka         91306   $472    1
Sunland          91040   $465    1
Azusa            91702   $405    1
Palmdale         93552   $280    1
Lancaster        93534   $210    1
Beverly Hills    90210   $3,455  0
Pacific Plsds    90272   $2,200  0
Palos Vrds Pen.  90274   $1,798  0
San Marino       91108   $1,679  0
Calabasas        91302   $1,640  0
LA/Bel-Air       90077   $1,625  0
LA/Brentwood     90049   $1,533  0
Encino           91436   $1,300  0
La Canada Flnt   91011   $1,000  0
Stevenson Ranch  91381   $930    0
Sherman Oaks     91403   $900    0
Agoura Hills     91301   $869    0
Sherman Oaks     91423   $780    0
Woodland Hills   91367   $753    0
Pasadena         91107   $670    0
La Crescenta     91214   $650    0
Valencia         91355   $635    0
Chatsworth       91311   $595    0
Santa Clarita    91390   $580    0
Claremont        91711   $578    0
Long Beach       90815   $568    0
Valencia         91354   $563    0
Castaic          91384   $540    0
Sylmar           91342   $520    0
La Verne         91750   $505    0
Sun Valley       91352   $468    0
Santa Clarita    91350   $456    0
Tujunga          91042   $440    0
Palmdale         93551   $365    0
Lancaster        93536   $310    0
Palmdale         93550   $250    0
Lancaster        93535   $238    0

Linky

Consider Gods Handiwork

Nice.

GuICU: Guile Unicode v0.0 released

And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do.

Late last night, I finally uploaded the first alpha of the my Guile Unicode library to SourceForge. There is more to do, of course, but, I had to released it lest it ruin Christmas. I've got gingerbread to bake and vacuuming to do, and I couldn't do it with the release unfinished.

I originally intended to do a straight wrapping of IBM's icu4c, but, it is heavily UTF-16, and most of the non-Java GNU open source world tends to be moving toward UTF-8. So, in a act of bravado, I started my own Unicode library from scratch in Scheme. But that Unicode standard is hundreds and hundreds of pages. I would die before I completed anything.

So, back to ICU I went. I've tried to hide the underlying UTF-16 nature of ICU by having the wrapped functions deal primarily in full codepoints, UTF-32. It looks fairly effortless on the Guile side, but, under the hood, it is class-A Jerry-rigging.

So a couple of days ago, I knew the code was decent. Nothing left but the autotools crap. Autotools is an beautiful hack. It is amazing until you want to deviate from its expected norms, and then it becomes hateful. In a way, getting autotools (specifically automake) working is like a good Christian's relationship to God. You have to humble yourself to automake. It is not "how do I make automake do what I want". It is "how to I humble myself to the will of automake so that I am not punishing myself."

When "make check" began working, I knew I do the code-fu. Hi-yah!

How long have I been sitting here? I'm not sure I remember a life before unit test and documentation and autotools...