Cleveland vs. Inner Ring Suburbs (Euclid, Cleveland Heights: real estate, condo, high crime)

[teacherdad]

My cousin works for Cleveland- a group like a local "Yeah Cleveland" Chamber. Not sure what it is. Lately, she's been hinting at a TON of positives coming soon to Cleveland. Sounds like the city is spending $$$$$ on the downtown or near there. Sounds very promising.

[Clevelander17]

Randall Park Mall is actually located in North Randall. The Racino is in North Randall as well. Warrensville Heights shares a school district with North Randall (and Highland Hills), but these are three separate cities. I think they should merge, but either way, that entire area does have some potential and there is a lot of open land, but as you get closer to Cleveland you'll find more blighted areas and neighborhoods that are mostly indistinguishable from Cleveland. I'll actually be curious to see what happens to those three cities because I see some room for growth.

[TBideon]

I feel the gains of the gentrified neighborhoods don't compare to the severe losses of the blue collar/working class/low income areas that comprise the vast majority of the city itself. Hence why I earlier stated there would be serious overall decline to come in Cleveland proper. Beyond downtown, have Ohio City, Tremont and the other bright spots even seen population gains?

I'll gladly be wrong on this one.

[bjimmy24]

Originally Posted by TBideon

I feel the gains of the gentrified neighborhoods don't compare to the severe losses of the blue collar/working class/low income areas that comprise the vast majority of the city itself. Hence why I earlier stated there would be serious overall decline to come in Cleveland proper. Beyond downtown, have Ohio City, Tremont and the other bright spots even seen population gains?

I'll gladly be wrong on this one.

An absence of population gains doesn't always mean it's a bad situation. For example, Ohio City has probably actually lost population, but the raw numbers are misleading. Look at who's replacing the people- educated, wealthier, financially stable people who tend to not have big families, if families at all.

Other neighborhoods that are still doing fine or making a big rebound: University Circle/ Little Italy, Gordon Square/Detroit Shoreway, Larchmere/Shaker Square, Kamm's Corners, Asiatown/general Cleveland State area, the Flats (if not included as "downtown"), North Collinwood. A couple other neighborhoods might also fit in this category, but I just don't have enough experience with them to make that claim.

i still can't think of a time in Cleveland's recent history where things looked even remotely as bright for the future as right now. This is really the first time I've ever seen people working together and building communities from the ground up and coming up with terrific ideas along the way. The past has always been top down- let's build stadiums and voila! Equating the present with past "revival" attempts is not nearly as clever as a lot of people think. The similarities are just not really there.

[averysgore]

An obvious starting point for comparison is the median housing value.

Cuyahoga County Home Prices and Home Values - Zillow

There used to be a convenient table of every city in the county, but I can't find it now. But on the far right under the first graph, click on "View Data Table" and click "Cities." It has a bunch of Cuy. County cities along with others throughout Ohio. Some inner ring burbs:

Cleveland: 51,700

Brook Park: 97,700
Cleveland Heights: 98,200
East Cleveland: 59,000
Euclid: 62,900
Fairview Park: 128,700
Garfield: 58,600
Lakewood: 121,400
Maple: 54,100 (below East Cleveland?)
Parma: 91,100
Shaker Heights: 199,700
South Euclid: 80,000
Warrensville Heights: 62,600
Youngstown: 33,800 (LOL)

Looks like Shaker is the runaway winner here. Of course, this isn't the only factor of desirablility. Brook Park and Cleveland Heights have roughly the same housing value, but if you're young and single Cleveland Heights is more desirable.

It also has a table of neighborhoods. Kamm's Corner is the winner here with average home value $100,800, higher than Parma and Cleveland Heights. Downtown and Edgewater are next in line.

[Cleverfield]

Originally Posted by averysgore

An obvious starting point for comparison is the median housing value.

Maple: 54,100 (below East Cleveland?)

You have to remember that East Cleveland includes the very affluent Forest Hills neighborhood. Maple Heights has no such neighborhood, and, like much of East Cleveland it has fallen extremely hard (just doesn't look quite as bad because of the newer housing stock).

[reretarff]

Originally Posted by Clevelander17

A number of the suburbs discussed above are near and dear to my heart for various reasons, but I think that your outlook is a bit too rosy for most of them. Short of significant gentrification or government intervention (i.e. demolishing homes), I fear that many are going to continue to deteriorate and be victims of flight.

The tearing down of abandoned houses is a big problem, but it isn't much of a problem in the suburbs as far as I've seen. Unlike in the city of Cleveland, houses are torn down for a good reason, such as being in too bad of a condition to live in, and sometimes if it has pipe or electrical or even asbestos problems. Usually in the suburbs, a house gets built on top of the old houses if that ever happens. As for flight, it has stopped and actually has been starting to reverse. Along with the inner city, more architects and realtors are starting to look in to these areas and are even building new houses on top of older, rundown ones. I think by 2020, the city of Cleveland, along with Cleveland's suburbs will be in much better shape than they are now.

[reretarff]

Originally Posted by averysgore

An obvious starting point for comparison is the median housing value.

Cuyahoga County Home Prices and Home Values - Zillow

There used to be a convenient table of every city in the county, but I can't find it now. But on the far right under the first graph, click on "View Data Table" and click "Cities." It has a bunch of Cuy. County cities along with others throughout Ohio. Some inner ring burbs:

Cleveland: 51,700

Brook Park: 97,700
Cleveland Heights: 98,200
East Cleveland: 59,000
Euclid: 62,900
Fairview Park: 128,700
Garfield: 58,600
Lakewood: 121,400
Maple: 54,100 (below East Cleveland?)
Parma: 91,100
Shaker Heights: 199,700
South Euclid: 80,000
Warrensville Heights: 62,600
Youngstown: 33,800 (LOL)

Looks like Shaker is the runaway winner here. Of course, this isn't the only factor of desirablility. Brook Park and Cleveland Heights have roughly the same housing value, but if you're young and single Cleveland Heights is more desirable.

It also has a table of neighborhoods. Kamm's Corner is the winner here with average home value $100,800, higher than Parma and Cleveland Heights. Downtown and Edgewater are next in line.

Cleveland Heights is full of historic 100+ year old mansion filled tree lined streets. Most of them are worth $400,000 up to over a million dollars. As for the smaller houses there, they are in good shape in safe, tree lined neighborhoods. Plus, Cleveland Heights has lots of bars and restaurants along Cedar Road, Lee Road and Coventry Road. On top of that, Cleveland Heights is close to the east suburbs, University Circle and Little Italy, and Downtown. I'm sure that the house value there is quite high, also because the taxes are so high there.

[Cleverfield]

Originally Posted by reretarff

Cleveland Heights is full of historic 100+ year old mansion filled tree lined streets. Most of them are worth $400,000 up to over a million dollars. As for the smaller houses there, they are in good shape in safe, tree lined neighborhoods. Plus, Cleveland Heights has lots of bars and restaurants along Cedar Road, Lee Road and Coventry Road. On top of that, Cleveland Heights is close to the east suburbs, University Circle and Little Italy, and Downtown. I'm sure that the house value there is quite high, also because the taxes are so high there.

I love Cleveland Heights, and wish I didn't have to say this, but the realist in me has to say that your picture of CH is far too rosy. The parts south of Cedar, and surrounding Coventry (south of Mayfield) are very nice. The area between Cedar and Mayfield is doing okay, but seems to be on the decline. North of Mayfield has declined significantly, but is still decent for the most part (the part West of Lee Rd. being the exception). North of Monticello it starts to get rough, especially around Noble Road and Taylor as you get close to East Cleveland. While there are still lots of portions of CH that are very nice, large portions of it have declined a huge amount since their heyday and seem to be continuing down that path. It's unfortunate, and I wish there were a way to stop it, but as of now there doesn't seem to be.

[Clevelander17]

Originally Posted by Cleverfield

I love Cleveland Heights, and wish I didn't have to say this, but the realist in me has to say that your picture of CH is far too rosy. The parts south of Cedar, and surrounding Coventry (south of Mayfield) are very nice. The area between Cedar and Mayfield is doing okay, but seems to be on the decline. North of Mayfield has declined significantly, but is still decent for the most part (the part West of Lee Rd. being the exception). North of Monticello it starts to get rough, especially around Noble Road and Taylor as you get close to East Cleveland. While there are still lots of portions of CH that are very nice, large portions of it have declined a huge amount since their heyday and seem to be continuing down that path. It's unfortunate, and I wish there were a way to stop it, but as of now there doesn't seem to be.

I think there is a way to stop it, but many people wouldn't like the solution.

First off, 90-95% of the structures in the Superior Triangle (north of Mayfield, east of Coventry, west of Superior) should be torn down immediately. What happens with the land next, I'm not sure, but anything would be better than what we currently have there. Maybe extend Forest Hill Park west, maybe put in condos, maybe bring in businesses or try to build an office park, any of this would be better than the blight that is currently there.

Next, I would look for any other additional blighted buildings near the East Cleveland border and tear down as much as possible. I realize that this isn't very creative, but there are homes that are in near disrepair that have become havens for Section 8 and crime. It's gotta go if CH is going to stop the bleeding. And actually this should have happened 20 years ago.

Finally, I would use Shaker Heights' strategy and put up as many road barriers as possible between itself and East Cleveland. You might be noticing a theme here, but all of CH's problems stem from East Cleveland's issues that have crossed the border and CH would be wise to take steps to stop it as much as possible.

Few at city hall probably want to hear this, but Cleveland Heights is stronger with a population of 35,000 with the above measures taken than it is at 45,000 keeping the status quo.