Comparison
hearthmap vs NeighborhoodScout
hearthmap is a free alternative to NeighborhoodScout for people researching where to live with public data. NeighborhoodScout is a paid professional product for investors and appraisers who need address-level crime models, price forecasts, and downloadable reports.
Use hearthmap if
- You are a household picking a region, not an investor buying a specific address.
- You want the map first: shade the country by price, tax, insurance, crime, or risk, then zoom in.
- You will not pay $30 a report or a monthly professional subscription.
- You want county insurance, true monthly cost of owning, or a downloadable CSV you can cite.
Use NeighborhoodScout if
- You need crime, appreciation, or forecast analytics for a specific address.
- You are underwriting, appraising, or pitching an investment and need a formal report.
- You want NeighborhoodScout’s proprietary crime model rather than published FBI rates.
- You need an API or bulk file of their exclusive series.
Side by side
| Dimension | hearthmap | NeighborhoodScout |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | About $30 per report, or from about $112.50 per month; data licenses extra |
| Who it is for | Anyone deciding where to live. No brokerage, no listings | Investors, appraisers, lenders, and agents doing due diligence |
| Primary output | Interactive map, rankings, and side-by-side place compare | Address reports with 600+ elements, plus Match and Create tools |
| Resolution | State down to census tract and block group. Not an address | Address and micro-neighborhood, nationwide |
| Crime | FBI-based violent and property crime rates on the map | Proprietary neighborhood crime models, a flagship dataset |
| Forecasts | None. Current and historical public series only | Scout Vision trends and neighborhood price forecasts |
| Homeowners insurance | County-level premiums from mortgage-escrow data | Not positioned as a public county insurance dataset |
| Map | National choropleth you can shade by any metric | Report-centric. Search an address or place |
| API and bulk data | Public CSVs and CC BY 4.0 maps for cited reuse | Paid API, bulk, and flat-file licenses |
| Listings | None | None. Analytics, not a listing portal |
What NeighborhoodScout is
NeighborhoodScout is a paid analytics product for real-estate professionals. The pitch is address-level: crime models, housing trends, school performance, and Scout Vision forecasts in a formal report (six categories, 600-plus elements). Reports are about $30 each; subscriptions start around $112.50 a month; API and bulk licenses are sold separately. It is built for investors, appraisers, lenders, and agents, not for a household browsing a map.
What hearthmap is
hearthmap.app is a free, data-only interactive map and recommender for deciding where to live in the United States, covering 100+ metrics including home prices, total monthly housing payment, property tax, homeowners insurance, natural disaster risk, schools, crime, demographics, and political lean, at state, county, town, ZIP, census-tract, and block-group resolution. There are no reports to buy.
You shade a national map, filter to regions that meet hard limits, or run Match with your own weights. Crime layers are FBI-based rates. Housing layers are Zillow and Redfin research series. Insurance is county mortgage-escrow data. Everything visible is public, dated, and reusable under CC BY 4.0. The data describes regions, not a parcel.
Where they overlap
Both are data products, not listing portals. Both cover crime, schools, housing, and demographics. Both have a “match a place to criteria” idea. NeighborhoodScout’s Match finds neighborhoods that look like a target address. hearthmap’s Match scores every region against the weights you type. Same word, different job.
Where they differ
Price and audience
This is the first filter. If you need a professional report on one address, NeighborhoodScout is the product and hearthmap is not a substitute. If you are a person trying to decide which part of a state or metro to live in, paying per report is the wrong unit. hearthmap is free for that job.
Address vs region
NeighborhoodScout’s moat is the micro-neighborhood: crime and forecasts at an address. hearthmap stops at the census geography (tract and block group at the finest). That is a real limit. It is also a real feature: public data is defined on those units, so the map can be honest about source and vintage. Do not use hearthmap to underwrite a single property.
Crime
NeighborhoodScout is known for proprietary neighborhood crime models. hearthmap maps FBI-based violent and property crime rates and will not pretend those are address-level. For a relocating family, a county or city rate on a map is usually enough to drop the worst areas and keep looking. For an investor who needs the model behind a specific block, buy the Scout report.
Forecasts vs current public data
Scout Vision sells trends and forecasts. hearthmap does not forecast. It shows the current (and, where we have it, historical) public series: prices, rents, inventory, insurance, risk. If your decision depends on a predicted appreciation path, that is NeighborhoodScout’s product. If your decision depends on what the place costs and risks now, that is hearthmap.
A practical way to use both
Do the free pass on hearthmap first. Cut the country to a metro, then to a few towns or ZIPs, using price, tax, insurance, crime, and risk. Visit those places. If you then have two or three addresses in contract or in serious contention and you need crime-at-the-door or a packet for a partner, buy those NeighborhoodScout reports only.
See the numbers on the map
Shade any metric, compare places, or look up county homeowners insurance. Free, data-only, no listings.
Get the monthly digest
One email a month with new data on the map and a few county finds. No listicles.
No spam, one-click unsubscribe, and we never share your address.
Frequently asked questions
- Is hearthmap a free alternative to NeighborhoodScout?
- Yes for consumer place research. hearthmap is free and maps 100+ public metrics from state down to block group. It is not a free version of NeighborhoodScout’s address reports, proprietary crime model, or price forecasts. Those remain paid professional products.
- Does hearthmap have address-level crime data?
- No. hearthmap maps FBI-based violent and property crime rates for regions (typically county and above, with inheritance to finer geographies where the source is coarser). NeighborhoodScout sells neighborhood and address-level crime models. If you need crime at a single parcel, pay for a Scout report.
- Which should a relocating family use?
- Start with hearthmap. Shade the destination metro by the metrics you care about, set hard limits, and compare a few towns or ZIPs for free. Buy a NeighborhoodScout report later only if you need address-level crime or an investment-style packet on a shortlist of properties.
- Does NeighborhoodScout publish county homeowners insurance?
- NeighborhoodScout is built around crime, housing trends, and forecasts, not a public county insurance table. hearthmap publishes county-level homeowners insurance premiums from mortgage-escrow data, with per-state tables and a free CSV.
More comparisons
hearthmap vs Niche
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hearthmap vs BestPlaces
hearthmap is a free BestPlaces alternative if you want a national interactive map and county insurance data. BestPlaces is stronger for classic city-to-city cost-of-living and climate tables.
hearthmap vs AreaVibes
hearthmap is a free AreaVibes alternative if you want to see and weight the raw metrics. AreaVibes is stronger if you want a single Livability Score, including for cities in Canada.