Neighborhood · Ranked #14,308 of 84,120 nationally

Dorchester Heights Eviction Risk: Elevated , Boston

Tract 25025060400 · Suffolk County, MA · pop 5,071 · neighborhood within 0.1 mi

With a score of 6.7/10, tract 25025060400 in the Dorchester Heights area of Boston, MA reads elevated for landlord eviction risk. Population here is 5,071. Against Suffolk County at 47.0%, 17% of renters here are cost-burdened.

Risk score

6.7

Elevated

Confidence 100% · 1–10 scale

Household mix · 100 hh

Burdened renters 9% Stable renters 43% Owners 48%

Tract context

Occupied units2,513

Renter share52.6%

SVI overall0.01

Poverty rate4.1%

Median income$186,174

Percentile rank

Higher percentile = riskier than more peers.

Geographic context

Risk heat across Boston and the region

Centroid at 42.3324, -71.0429 · click any tract to drill in

Why Dorchester Heights scores 6.7

9 axes · 1 = landlord-friendly

Local political climate

Inherited from Boston

8.5

Regional political climate

2024 county presidential margin

8.2

State political climate

Massachusetts legislature & governorship

6.2

Economic stress

4.1% poverty · this tract

1.0

Supply constraint

$3,101 rent vs county FMR

5.9

Rent control risk

Inherited from Boston

8.0

Eviction process difficulty

State law sets the calendar

8.0

Tenant organizing strength

Inherited from Boston

8.5

Housing court bias

Inherited from Boston

8.0

How Dorchester Heights compares

Risk score vs. parent city, county, state.

CDC Social Vulnerability Index

SVI percentile: 1

CDC/ATSDR 2022. Higher = more vulnerable. National percentile across 84k tracts.

0%Socioeconomic
0%Household composition
2%Racial/ethnic minority
49%Housing & transportation

Historical context · 1930s redlining

HOLC grade: D: Hazardous (Redlined)

This tract sits within an area graded by the Home Owners' Loan Corporation in the 1930s. Grade D meant Black, immigrant, and poor neighborhoods systematically denied mortgage credit. These designations suppressed minority homeownership for generations and remain a documented predictor of present-day eviction filings and rent burden.

0%Grade A
0%Grade B
33%Grade C
59%Grade D · redlined

Source: Mapping Inequality (americanpanorama.org), 1935-1940 HOLC residential security maps, aggregated to 2020 census tracts by area share. CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.

Eviction filings

Court-record eviction history

Court-validated eviction filings collected from county clerks and consolidated by the Eviction Lab at Princeton University. Filing rate is filings per 100 renter households.¹

Historic baseline (2000–2018)

59Total filings over 5 yrs
0.76%Avg annual filing rate
0.9%Peak (2014)
14Filings in 2016 (latest validated)

Filings by year 2012 to 2016

Filings stayed roughly flat over the past 5 months.

Pandemic-era tracking (2020–2021)

22Total filings 2020-21
0.5Avg monthly (observed)
0.8Pre-pandemic baseline
0.57×Ratio to baseline

Monthly filings 2020–2021 2020-01-01 to 2023-11-01

Pandemic filings ran far below baseline (moratorium effect). Eviction Lab tracked Boston, MA as part of its 34-metro Eviction Tracking System.

Comparable tracts

Census tracts with similar eviction risk

Within Dorchester Heights. Closest by Eviction Risk Score.

CDC PLACES 2023 · health & economic stress

Eviction-adjacent indicators

Crude prevalence of conditions linked to housing loss. Source: CDC PLACES (cwsq-ngmh), 2023 model-based small-area estimates.

6.6%Housing insecurity
4.0%Utility-shutoff threat
5.9%Food insecurity
5.9%SNAP enrollment
5.0%Transit barriers
2.8%No health insurance
15.9%Frequent mental distress
16.7%Any disability

Analysis

What drives eviction risk in Dorchester Heights

Average gross rent is $3,101, 44% above the Boston average. Pulling hardest the other way is economic stress at 1/10. Sitting well above the midpoint, local political climate reads 8.5/10.

Running hot, tenant-organizing strength reads 8.5/10. Against the Suffolk County average of 7.9, this tract reads safer for landlords by 1.2 points. Princeton's Eviction Lab logged 59 filings here across 5 tracked years.

Housing insecurity runs 6.6% against 14.2% nationally. Inability to pay a utility bill runs 4.0% against 9.2% nationally. Utility arrears usually lead rent arrears by a month or two. The worst year on record was 2014, when 0.9% of renter households were served.

This ground was mapped D ("Hazardous") on the 1930s HOLC security maps for Boston. That grading determined who could get a mortgage, and its imprint on tenure and rent burden is still visible in the ACS data above. In a typical year about 0.8% of renter households face a filing. That is riskier than roughly 83% of the 84,120 US census tracts in this model.

Tract-level figures come from the ACS 5-year release and are rebuilt whenever that, the court-record feed, or the statutory ledger behind the score changes.

Frequently asked

About tract 25025060400

What is the eviction-risk score for census tract 25025060400?

Census tract 25025060400 in the Dorchester Heights neighborhood scores 6.7/10 (Elevated tier). The Eviction Risk Score blends state law, county filing rates, parent-city politics, and tract-specific rent-to-income ratios + poverty signals.

What is the average rent in tract 25025060400?

Median gross rent is $3,101/month (ACS 5-year 2023, table B25064). 17% of renter households are cost-burdened.

What is the poverty rate in tract 25025060400?

4.1% of residents in tract 25025060400 live below the federal poverty line (ACS B17001, 2023). Population: 5,071.

How socially vulnerable is tract 25025060400?

CDC Social Vulnerability Index ranks this tract in the 1th percentile nationally. Sub-themes: socioeconomic 0th, household 0th, minority 2th, housing 49th.

Is tract 25025060400 considered part of Dorchester Heights?

Yes. Per Census Bureau 2020 Block Assignment Files, the plurality of blocks in tract 25025060400 fall within Dorchester Heights (neighborhood centroid within 0.1 miles, OSM data).

How many evictions are filed each year in tract 25025060400?

Princeton Eviction Lab recorded 59 eviction filings across 5 validated years in tract 25025060400 (2000-2018). The average annual filing rate is 0.76% of renter households, peaking at 0.9% in 2014. Source: Eviction Lab tract-validated 2024 release.

Did eviction filings in tract 25025060400 drop during COVID?

Pandemic-era filings ran 0.57× the pre-COVID monthly baseline. Filings dropped sharply, likely a moratorium effect. Tracked by the Eviction Lab Eviction Tracking System (Boston eviction risk, MA), 2020-2021.

What share of households in tract 25025060400 struggle to pay rent?

About 6.6% of adults in this tract reported housing insecurity (could not pay rent or mortgage in the past 12 months), per the CDC PLACES 2023 model-based small-area estimate. 4.0% also reported utility shutoff threats, a frequent precursor to eviction filings.

How does tract 25025060400 compare to Boston overall?

Tract 25025060400 scores 6.7/10, lower than the parent city of Boston at 8.1/10. City-scale signals (state law, local rent controls, court bias) are inherited from Boston eviction risk; what makes this tract different are its tract-specific economic stress and supply-constraint sub-scores.

Q10

Was tract 25025060400 historically redlined?

Yes. This tract sits inside an area graded by the Home Owners' Loan Corporation in the 1930s, with a dominant grade of D. 59% of the tract's area was rated D ("Hazardous"), the redlined tier. HOLC redlining systematically denied mortgage credit to Black, immigrant, and working-class neighborhoods and remains a documented predictor of present-day eviction filings, rent burden, and homeownership gaps. Source: Mapping Inequality (americanpanorama.org), Robert K. Nelson et al.

Sibling tracts

Highest-risk tracts in Boston

Top eight tracts in Boston ranked by composite eviction-risk score.

Eviction Lab tract-level court records (2000-2018) and Eviction Tracking System, Princeton University. Open Data Commons Attribution license. evictionlab.org