New Hispanic Housing Areas - Since 2000 many Latinos have settled in counties that once had few Latinos, continuing a pattern that began in the previous decade.But there are subtle differences in Hispanic settlement patterns in the current decade compared with those of the 1990s.

The dispersion of Latinos in the new century has tilted more to counties in the West and the Northeast. Despite the new tilt, however, the South accounted for a greater share of overall Latino population growth than any other region in the new century. There is also an ever-growing concentration of Hispanic population growth in metropolitan areas.

These findings emerge from the Pew Hispanic Center's analysis of the Census Bureau's 2007 county population estimates, supplemented by 1990 and 2000 county population counts from the Decennial Censuses.

For the purposes of this report, the Pew Hispanic Center has identified 676 fast-growing Hispanic counties among the nation’s total of 3,141 counties. These counties all share two characteristics: a 2007 Latino population of at least 1,000; and an above-average Hispanic growth of at least 41% from 2000 to 2007.

More than three-quarters (528) of these 676 fast-growing Hispanic counties also experienced fast Hispanic growth during the 1990s, exemplifying the continuity in Latino settlement patterns since 1990. At the same time, however, the addition of 148 counties experiencing rapid growth, as well as the cooling off of Hispanic population growth in some formerly rapidly growing counties, reflects the changes in the regional and metropolitan patterns in Latino growth in the new century.

For example, some counties in Maine, Vermont and Massachusetts in the Northeast and in Montana, New Mexico and California in the West that have experienced fast Hispanic population growth in the new century were not fast-growers in the 1990s. In the South, too, Hispanics have dispersed to some new settlement areas in this decade—perhaps most notably to several counties in Louisiana, whose Hispanic populations have sharply increased in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Also, while the strong Hispanic growth that some parts of the Midwest experienced in the 1990s has continued into the new century, the formerly fast rates of Hispanic growth in other areas of that region especially in economically hard-hit counties in western Michigan and western Minnesota have fallen below average in the new century.

These 676 fast-growing Hispanic counties have also experienced significant growth in their non-Hispanic populations. In the aggregate, the non-Hispanic population of these 676 counties has increased by 9.9 million since 2000, accounting for virtually all of the nation’s 10 million increase in non-Hispanics during this decade. In short, growth begets growth, irrespective of ethnicity. The counties to which Latinos are dispersing in the new century are also attracting non-Latinos.

Hispanics residing in these fast-growing Hispanic counties have somewhat different demographic characteristics than their Hispanic counterparts in older, established, but more slow-growing Hispanic counties. The most marked difference is in the adult gender balance. The slow-growing Hispanic counties have slightly more adult male Latinos than adult female Latinos, 104 men for every 100 women. In contrast, in the fast-growing Hispanic counties there are 120 adult men for every 100 adult women. Also, immigrants make up a greater share of the Hispanic population in the fast-growing counties (42%) than they do in older, established Hispanic counties (39%). Similarly, a modestly higher share of Hispanics are not U.S. citizens in the fast-growing counties than in slow-growing Hispanic counties.