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Here is an example on extracting a custom data file using American FactFinder. Our goal is to create a data set containing information on median household income at zip code level for all zip code in California. For example, a segment of the data set would look like this:
Here are the steps for creating this data file. The best way of following these steps is to do it in real-time starting at U.S. Census Bureau's web site. Once you are familiar with the process, you can actually start from Step 5.
Step 1: From the main webpage of U.S. Census Bureau, click on American FactFinder.
Step 2: Click on Data Sets
Step 3: Summary File 3 contains information on population and housing data (such as birth place, education, income and such).
Step 4: Click on the radio button for SF 3, you will see an expansion of choices.
Step 5: Click on Custom Table, you will see the following and this is where we can select cases and variables.
Step 6: Now we begin the process of selecting our variables and cases for our data set. Since we are going to choose all zip codes for California, we will use "geo within geo" method. So click on "geo within geo". You will see the following page.
Step 7: From "Show me all" area, choose the last choice: 5-Digit Zip Code Tabulation Areas; from "That are" area choose Fully contained and from "Select a State" area select California. Now it looks like this:
Step 8: Click on the first line: All 5-Digit Zip Code Tabulation Areas and then click on Add button. We now have all the geographic information ready.
Step 9: Click on Next button. We are now ready to choose our variable(s). This is done by using "Select a table and click 'Go'" panel. We can see that P53 corresponds to Median Household Income in 1999 (Dollars). We will click on it and then click on Go.
Step 10: Sometimes a table corresponding to more than one variables. We will then be given the choice to further choose our variables. In our case, we only have one choice, that is the median income. We will click on the little square beside it and then click on Add.
Step 11: Click on the little square beside the variable name and then click on Next. We will see the following page.
Step 12: Click on "Show Result" and you will see something as the following.
You can then save the data as an Excel file or comma separated file by click on Print/Download and then choose Download.
Step 13: After you click on Download, you will see the following window. For this type of tables, it is actually easier to save the file as an Excel file. So just take the default and click on OK. There are actually multiple files and they are saved as a compressed file, usually named as output.zip. If there is an output.zip already, it will be output1.zip, etc. Click here to get the zip file we just created. In this zip file, there are two Excel files. One is the actual data file which ends as _date1.xls and the other one is the geography information file which ends as _geo.xls.
There seem to be many steps. Once you have done this once or twice, it becomes fairly straightforward.
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