An outsider’s neighborhood guide to Los Angeles

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If you loved your old neighborhood back in New York, or Chicago, can a website help you find a similar kind of place in Los Angeles? I am doubtful, but the website Homethinking is trying to do the job.

The website uses census data to analyze demographic characteristics of a neighborhood, and to find similar neighborhoods in other cities. So if you’re familiar with New York City neighborhoods, and want to find their Los Angeles demographic equivalents, you would find that:

SoHo is like: Pico/Robertson and Silver Lake;
Little Italy is like: Atwater Village and Leimert Park;
Chelsea is like: Mid City West, Los Feliz and Hollywood Hills.

Somewhat amusing, but I’m not sure there is much value there -- the ‘Chelsea is like’ example failed to come up with West Hollywood, probably because West Hollywood is not in the city of Los Angeles. The site lists only neighborhoods in the city of L.A.

I’d be curious to hear your thoughts on this site, which has a few other bells and whistles, and is mainly devoted to helping readers pick the right real estate agent.

-- Peter Viles

Photo: Searching for a neighborhood at the Grove shopping center. Credit: Los Angeles Times