Overview

Selling Somerville: Identifying home sales hot spots to organize tenants and prevent displacement

Overview:

Home sales can cause direct displacement of tenants when new owners redevelop the building or rapidly increase rent prices. This problem is particularly acute in Somerville, Massachusetts where the 2022 completion of MBTA’s Green Line Extension prompted an increased interest in home acquisitions by property developers and concerns about subsequent rent increases and no-fault evictions (Wilson, 2022).

This project utilizes home sales data from October 2022-October 2024 and demographic data from the American Community Survey (ACS) to identify neighborhoods with high rates of home sales and high risk of displacement in Somerville. Collectively, this data will inform tenant organizing and land trust acquisitions of two Somerville community organizations - the Community Action Agency of Somerville (CAAS) and the Somerville Community Land Trust (SCLT).

CAAS intends to identify priority neighborhoods – based on rates of home sales and demographic characteristics – to target their tenant organizing efforts which support tenants in understanding and advocating for their rights when their home goes up for sale. Since September 2021, CAAS has organized more than 54 households of tenants across 14 multi-family buildings in Somerville to prevent displacement amidst building sales, rent increases, and no-fault evictions (CAAS Somerville).

Simultaneously, SCLT plans to continue acquiring homes to rent or sell to Somerville residents at affordable rates, employing data on rates of home sales and neighborhood demographics to target purchases in neighborhoods with the highest risk of displacement. SCLT operates under the traditional community land trust (CLT) model; CLTs typically acquire property in the same way other developers do, but instead of attempting to maximize profit, CLTs rent or sell the homes on the property at an affordable rate (Somerville Community Land Trust).

Instructions:

Click the buttons at the top of this page to access visualization tools designed for exploring home sales trends and demographic characteristics in Somerville.

The Mapping Sales and Neighborhood Characteristics tab shows home sales categorized by 1-family, 2-family, or 3-family homes in each Somerville neighborhood. (Note: Data on sales of larger multi-family buildings was not available at the time of analysis). Next to the home sales map is a multi-tab map to visualize racial and ethnic demographics, median household income, proportion of renters, and proportion of cost-burdened renters spending more than 30% of their income on rent by Census block group. Together, these maps paint a picture of Somerville’s neighborhood characteristics and provide insight into displacement risk across the city.

Both maps are interactive! On the home sales map, click on any part of Somerville to view the neighborhood name, and click on any point to learn more about the sale date, sale price, and number of units. On the demographic maps, click on any census block group to view its individual demographic characteristics. (Note: If you are unable to select a point on the home sales map, hover over the layers icon in the top right corner and toggle the “Home Sales” layer off, then toggle it back on.)

The Visualizing Sales Trends tab provides additional data analysis of the following factors:

Proportion and Number of Sales by Neighborhood

Median Price per Square Foot by Neighborhood

Median Price per Square Foot by Number of Units

Hover over the interactive graphs to explore more information about sales frequency and price at the neighborhood level.

Application Developers

Becca Heilman, MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Erin Sheehan, MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Mapping Sales and Neighborhood Characteristics

Visualizing Sales Trends

Findings and Sources

Findings:

Over 500 Somerville homes were sold over the past two years, putting tenants at risk of displacement. Our analysis suggests rapid rates of home sales across all of Somerville. The Spring Hill and Winter Hill neighborhoods experienced the most sales, followed by Union Square, East Somerville, and Davis Square. The data suggests that displacement may be a risk across the entire city. Despite this overall risk, neighborhood demographics can be used as a proxy to further predict risk of displacement and/or eviction.

Our spatial analysis focused on the following demographic traits to identify neighborhoods with the highest risk:

Racial and Ethnic Demographics: Neighborhoods with the highest proportion of Black and Latinx residents are most likely to experience high rates of eviction (Desmond & Gershenson, 2016).

Household Income: Communities with predominantly low-income households are most susceptible to displacement (Urban Displacement Project, 2021).

Proportion of Renters: Neighborhoods with the highest rates of renters are a prime opportunity for tenant organizing and advocacy.

Cost-Burden: For purposes of our analysis, we considered all households spending more than 30% of income on rent to be cost-burdened. Cost-burdened households often make significant sacrifices to afford their rent, including forgoing other basic needs, and these households are at a high-risk of displacement and/or eviction (NLIHC).

Many of Somerville’s neighborhoods are majority renter-occupied, particularly parts of Winter Hill, Union Square, Powderhouse Square, and Teele Square, where upwards of 80% of units are renter-occupied. Additionally, more than 60% of renters in parts of Teele Square, Powderhouse Square, Ball Square, Winter Hill, East Somerville, and Spring Hill are rent-burdened and paying more than 30% of their income on rent.

The analysis did not indicate a strong correlation between neighborhood racial demographics and number of home sales. However, communities of color in Metro Boston are less likely to own homes, and they have only a fraction of the net worth of white households (Federal Reserve Bank of Boston). The analysis indicates that parts of Teele Square, Winter Hill, East Somerville, Union Square, and Duck Village have relatively higher percentages of Black residents, while Winter Hill, East Somerville, Hillside, Union Square, and Spring Hill have relatively higher percentages of Hispanic residents than other neighborhoods.

An analysis of these demographic characteristics, coupled with rates of home sales, suggests that neighborhoods such as Winter Hill, East Somerville, Union Square, Powderhouse Square, Teele Square, and Spring Hill may be prime targets for tenant organizing and land trust acquisitions to prevent displacement.

Homes in Duck Village sold for the highest price per square foot, followed by Davis Square, Boynton Yards, and Teele Square. Homes in Ten Hills, East Somerville, Ball Square, and Winter Hill were lower-cost, indicating potential opportunities for land trust acquisition in these neighborhoods. Homes with more units also sold for a relatively lower price per square foot.

Data Sources:

The Warren Group & Wyner, B. (personal communication, 2024, November 19). Somerville Assessor’s Home Sales Data, October 2022-October 2024.

U.S. Census Bureau. (2022). B03002: Hispanic or Latino Origin by Race. https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B03002

U.S. Census Bureau. (2022). B19013: Median Household Income in the Past 12 Months. https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B19013?q=B19013:%20Median%20Household%20Income%20in%20the%20Past%2012%20Months%20(in%202023%20Inflation-Adjusted%20Dollars)

U.S. Census Bureau. (2022). B25003: Tenure. https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B25003?q=B25003:%20Tenure

US. Census Bureau. (2022). B25140: Housing Costs as a Percentage of Household Income in the Past 12 Months. https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B25140?q=B25140

Other Sources:

City of Boston, Massachusetts. (2020). Boston Displacement Risk Index: 2020. https://www.boston.gov/sites/default/files/file/2021/03/Boston%20Displacement%20Risk%20Map%202020_%20Summary%20Sheet.pdf

City of Somerville, Massachusetts. (2024, May 13). Neighborhoods. https://data.somervillema.gov/GIS-Data/Neighborhoods/n5md-vqta/about_data

City of Somerville, Massachusetts. Article IV: Condominium/Cooperative Conversion. https://library.municode.com/ma/somerville/codes/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=PTIICOOR_CH7HO_ARTIVCOCOCO

Community Action Agency of Somerville. Community Organizing and Advocacy Program. https://www.caasomerville.org/community-organizing

Desmond, M & Gershenson, C. (2017). Who gets evicted? Assessing individual, neighborhood, and network factors. Social Science Research, 62, 362-377. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2016.08.017

Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. (2015). The Color of Wealth in Boston. https://www.bostonfed.org/publications/one-time-pubs/color-of-wealth.aspx

National Low Income Housing Coalition. (2024, March). The Gap: A Shortage of Affordable Homes. https://nlihc.org/gap

Somerville Community Land Trust. An Introduction to Community Land Trusts. https://www.somervillecommunitylandtrust.org/an-intro-to-community-land-trusts

Urban Displacement Project. (2021, July 13). Housing Precarity Risk Model. https://www.urbandisplacement.org/maps/housing-precarity-risk-model/

Wilson, M. (2022, April 8). Green Line Extension Contributes to Increased Displacement Risk of Somerville Tenants. The Tufts Daily. https://www.tuftsdaily.com/article/2022/04/somerville-tenants-at-risk-of-displacement-by-glx