Although a growing body of research has examined and found a positive relationship between neighborhood crime and home foreclosures, some research suggests this relationship may not hold in all cities. This study uses city-level data to assess the relationship between foreclosures and crime by estimating longitudinal models with lags for monthly foreclosure and crime data in 128 cities from 1996 to 2011 in Southern California. We test whether these effects are stronger in cities with a combination of high economic inequality and high economic segregation; and whether they are stronger in cities with high racial/ethnic heterogeneity and high racial segregation. One month, and cumulative three month, six month, and 12-month lags of foreclosures are found to increase city level crime for all crimes except motor vehicle theft. The effect of foreclosures on these crime types is stronger in cities with simultaneously high levels of inequality but low levels of economic segregation. The effect of foreclosures on aggravated assault, robbery, and burglary is stronger in cities with simultaneously high levels of racial heterogeneity and low levels of racial segregation. On the other hand, foreclosures had a stronger effect on larceny and motor vehicle theft when they occurred in a city with simultaneously high levels of racial heterogeneity and high levels of racial segregation. There is evidence that the foreclosure crisis had large scale impacts on cities, leading to higher crime rates in cities hit harder by foreclosures. Nonetheless, the economic and racial characteristics of the city altered this effect.

Purpose: Prior studies have largely been unable to account for how variations in inequality across larger areas might impact crime rates in neighborhoods. We examine this broader context both in terms of the spatial area surrounding neighborhoods as well as the larger, city-level context. Although social disorganization, opportunity and relative deprivation theories are typically used to explain variations in neighborhood crime, these theories make differing predictions about crime when the broader areas that neighborhoods are embedded in are taken into account. Methods: We use data from the National Neighborhood Crime Study for 7956 neighborhoods in 79 cities. Multi-level models with spatial effects are estimated to explain the relationship between crime and city and neighborhood social and economic resources. Results: Disadvantage in the focal neighborhood and nearby neighborhoods increase neighborhood violent crime, consistent with social disorganization theory. However, relative deprivation provides a more robust explanation for understanding variation in property crime, as the difference in disadvantage between a neighborhood and nearby neighborhoods (or the broader community) explains higher levels of property crime. Conclusions: Criminologists need to account for the larger context of nearby neighborhoods, as well as the broader city, when understanding the effect of relative deprivation on neighborhood-level property crime rates.

Objectives: Longitudinal studies of the relationship between neighborhood change and changes in crime typically focus exclusively on the net level of change in key socio-demographic characteristics. Methods: We instead propose a demographic accounting strategy that captures the composition of neighborhood change: our measures capture which types of people are more likely to leave, stay, or enter the neighborhood. We use data for 3,325 tracts in the Southern California region over nearly two decades of 2000–2010 and 2010–2017 and construct flow measures based on race/ethnicity; the length of residence of owners and renters; the age structure. Results: These flow measures improve the predictive power of the models—implying important theoretical insights. Neighborhoods with higher percentages of middle-aged residents who recently entered the neighborhood exhibit larger increases in violent and property crime. The relative stability of those in the highest crime-prone ages (aged 15–29) is associated with the largest increases in violent and property crime. The greater loss of Black and Asian residents decreased crime while moderate outflows of Latinos increased crime. The mobility of long- and short-term renters was related to crime changes. Conclusions: This new technique will likely encourage further theoretical innovation for the neighborhoods and crime literature.