From cities to towns to neighborhoods, here’s where you should — and can afford to — settle down. See all 100.
By Shaina Mishkin, Prachi Bhardwaj, Olivia Raimonde, and Chloe Wilt | Money
To create MONEY’s Best Places to Live ranking, we looked only at places with populations of 50,000 or greater. Places with 300,000 or more people were broken down into neighborhoods, and from there we considered only neighborhoods with estimated populations between 5,000 and 200,000 people. We eliminated any place that had more than double the national crime risk, less than 85% of its state’s median household income, or a lack of ethnic diversity. This gave us 1,796 places.
We then collected nearly 160,000 different data points to narrow the list. We considered data on each place’s economic health, cost of living, ethnic and economic diversity, public education, income, health and safety, ease of living, and amenities, all provided by research partner Witlytic. We put the greatest weight on economic factors, housing, health and safety, diversity and cost of living. Quality of life, education and local amenities were also critical components.
