The one-story frame-and-board houses in Seneca Village were referred to as "shanties", which reflected their roughshod outward appearance, though some of the houses resembled log cabins. While the houses were not professionally constructed, their interiors were an improvement on the cramped tenements of Lower Manhattan. Land ownership among Black residents was much higher than that in the city as a whole: more than half owned property in 1850, five times the property ownership rate of all New York City residents at the time. One-fifth of Seneca Village's inhabitants owned their residences. Many of Seneca Village's Black residents were landowners and relatively economically secure compared to their downtown counterparts. At least one property owner, the Lyons family, lived in Lower Manhattan but owned property in Seneca Village.