- Dates
- 2000 – 2020
- Eras
- Modern era
- Concepts
- demographyhistoriography
- Within
- Beaver Island
Summary
This held Census API extract records, for the two townships that cover Beaver Island, how many dwellings the decennial census counted and how many of them anybody was living in.
| Census | Housing units | Occupied | Vacant | Vacant, seasonal |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | 741 | 258 | 483 | 463 |
| 2010 | 1,016 | 336 | 680 | 610 |
| 2020 | 944 | 276 | 668 | 598 |
Roughly nine in ten vacant units on Beaver Island are vacant because they are seasonal, recreational or occasional-use homes. In 2020 that is 598 of 668, or 63% of every dwelling on the island.
Evidence and limits
The variable numbering behind these rows is not stable across census vintages,
and getting it wrong fails quietly rather than loudly. Seasonal vacancy is
H5_006N in the 2020 DHC and H005006 in 2010 SF1, but the 2000 SF1 vacancy
table is one category shorter: there H005005 is the seasonal line and
H005006 is “for migrant workers”, which for these two townships is genuinely
zero. Reading the 2010 position onto 2000 therefore returns 0 seasonal units
for an overwhelmingly seasonal island — a plausible-looking number, not an
error message. Each vintage’s variable list was checked before these rows were
written.
The 2010 peak of 1,016 units and the 2020 figure of 944 should not be read as 72 dwellings disappearing. At this scale, changes in how units are classified as housing units at all — a derelict cabin, a structure mid-renovation — move the total by more than construction does.
This table is a count of Census housing units on one day each decade. It is not a parcel roll, a building-permit series, a record of who owns what, a measure of short-term rental activity, or an estimate of how many people are on the island in July.
See also
Sources
- Held table records total housing units, occupied units, vacant units and units vacant for seasonal, recreational or occasional use for Peaine and St. James townships. Island totals, as transparent sums of the two township rows: 741 units / 258 occupied / 483 vacant / 463 seasonal in 2000; 1,016 / 336 / 680 / 610 in 2010; 944 / 276 / 668 / 598 in 2020.demographics · township_housing_series
- Project provenance sidecar for the township housing series.Records the three Census datasets, the variable identifier used for each measure in each vintage, the county scope and the retrieval time. No public copy of this file is known; the archive holds one and can provide it on request.demographics · township_housing_series.provenance
- Model-based estimates held alongside the counts: 966 housing units, 578 vacant, 543 of those seasonal, 388 occupied, of which 362 owner-occupied and 26 renter-occupied. These are estimates with wide margins at this geography and are not comparable with the decennial counts above.demographics · acs2023_townships
Added 4 August 2026. Recent changes
Cite this article
Beaver Island Archive, “Census township housing series for Beaver Island, 2000–2020”, https://beaverislandarchive.org/documents/census-township-housing-series-2000-2020/, accessed [date], citing U.S. Census Bureau, decennial censuses 2000 (SF1), 2010 (SF1) and 2020 (DHC), county subdivisions, Charlevoix County, Michigan; retrieved 2026-08-04 via the Census API. (and 2 further sources listed on the page).
Last revised 2026-08-04. Fill in [date] with the date you read it — this page is static and cannot know that.
BibTeX for “Census township housing series for Beaver Island, 2000–2020”RIS for “Census township housing series for Beaver Island, 2000–2020”