Norfolk Demographics

The first thing most people do when they're considering purchasing a home in a new location is to check up on the population statistics to get a feel for how well they'll fit in there. For instance, if you were thinking of purchasing a condominium for sale in Toronto, Ontario you would look at whether your particular cultural group was adequately represented in the city, how many other people your age there might be, how crowded you might expect to feel there. Statistics can be tremendously useful in that respect, which is why we thought you might be interested in hearing some about Norfolk, Virginia.

Overall Population and Population Density

Each city has its ups and downs. Sometimes homes in Hudson Valley towns are all the rage and people are fighting over them, other times emphasis shifts to apartments and condos in larger cities. In this way, outlying towns and major cities are sometimes in a tug-of-war with one another over overall population and population densities. Between 1980 and 2000, outlying Virginia towns with access to Norfolk were slowly siphoning away its population at a rate between 2.2% and 13.3%. However, in recent years the city has begun making headway again and the population has grown by about .6%.

Population density is another important statistic, because in many cases there may be a lot of people living in a city. A huge population would normally make you assume the city was crowded and to avoid it you would choose Coboconk cottages out in the sticks instead. However, it may actually be that the large population is spread over a vast area and the city has a feeling of space to it. Norfolk falls into the average population density bracket. Its 94,000 housing units were spread at a rate averaging 1,700 per square mile.

Distribution of Ethnic Groups

For people who belong to a particular ethnic group, it is often comforting to know that there will be others who share your culture in your new city. Buying Lake Scugog real estate may not be the best option if this is your aim, for smaller towns tend to have smaller proportions of immigrants while larger cities, with their larger job markets, tend to have higher proportions. Norfolk has an average distribution of ethnic groups for a city of its size. About 48% of the population is Caucasian, 44% African American, 2% Asian, and 3% Hispanic, with smaller proportions (under 1%) of Pacific Islander and other Native American peoples.

Age, Gender and Marital Status

If you've given up on saving your Toronto resale home in the hopes of finding a city with a better dating pool, these stats may interest you. Nearly 40% of the population is married. 18% are single women and 10% were single seniors. 24% of the population is under 18 while 18% are between the ages of 18 and 24. 25 to 44 year-olds made up nearly 30% of the population and 11% were seniors. There are 104 men for every 100 women, mostly due to the high proportion of men serving in the military.