Charity shops. Often when an area starts to fail as a shopping hub and retailers close when landlords can't get a new business in and have a void they still have to pay business rates. The way to avoid this is to charge rent to a charity shop which doesn't have to pay business rates, so they win even if the charity shop is paying lower rent than the business before.

For example Muswell Hill.

Yeah I would say pawn shops and payday loan services are the biggest indicators of a neighborhood in decline. They seem like the two predatory businesses that show up just as a neighborhood is seeing people with any money leave.

Why barber shops? Don't well-to-do people also go to the barber to get their hair cut?

Of course not. They go to their stylist!

Most have the barber come to them or have a private barber in the building. My office has a separate room and a barber comes in every other week to cut hair.

Seriously? That is certainly not anything approaching the norm in the US.

They go to salons :).

(Joking.)

Tattoo parlors. Strip clubs. Hole-in-the-wall liquor stores. Pull-tab joints. Attended laundromats (people who live in bad neighborhoods don't have their own washers and dryers, and ones that are inside apartment buildings tend to get vandalized/broken into).

What's a pull-tab joint?

I imagine liquor stores that sell pull-tabs. I'm unaware of stores dedicated to selling pull-tabs but there are a lot of corner liquor stores that are more or less frequented by people purchasing pull-tabs and cigarettes more than anything else.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pull-tab

Ah, thanks. FWIW, the UK equivalent is the scratchcard:

https://www.national-lottery.co.uk/games/gamestore/scratchca...

You can buy these in most newsagents, and as far as i know there aren't dedicated shops for them.

There are indeed dedicated stores for selling them in some areas. It probably varies by state.

The More You Know

I've never seen any in California, but the gist holds true. It's a good indicator that it is a poor part of town.

Bars on the windows and doors.

Or windows that have been completely bricked up.