Best Places45226, OH Best Neighborhoods

2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026

Every neighborhood inside ZIP code 45226, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. Local pay runs high here, and housing takes the biggest bite out of it. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.

See the map of best neighborhoods

45226 ranks 9,871st of 33,110 U.S. zip codes on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on an educated workforce by a wide margin, and property taxes are the weak spot.

#9,871
of 33,110 zip codes
BestNeighborhood rank
Defaults weight crime safety, affordability, schools, and weather highest: the things hardest to change after a move
N/A
of 33,110 zip codes
Your rank
Set your priorities to see your rank

The best neighborhoods in 45226

Map of the best neighborhoods in the 45226 area, with better matches in green and worse matches in red
Click the map to explore
National median
Worse match Better match
Colorblind friendly off
Popular priorities:

BestNeighborhood is the only ranking that scores 40 measures of daily life neighborhood by neighborhood and lets you re-weight every one of them yourself.

45226's strengths and weaknesses

Top 3%An educated workforce
Top 5%Population health
Top 10%Cheap car insurance
Each measure against the national median. Bars to the right beat the median; bars to the left fall short. Percentiles compare 45226 with other zip codes.

Where 45226 ranks high

  • Educational attainmentBetter than 97% of zip codes
  • Health outlookBetter than 96% of zip codes
  • Cheap car insuranceBetter than 94% of zip codes
  • Healthcare accessBetter than 94% of zip codes
  • TransitBetter than 92% of zip codes

Where 45226 ranks low

  • Low property taxBetter than only 7% of zip codes
  • QuietBetter than only 8% of zip codes
  • School gradeD, better than only 9% of zip codes
  • Nice weatherabout 61 pleasant days a year, better than only 10% of zip codes
  • Crime safetyBetter than only 16% of zip codes

What it costs to buy a home in 45226

A household needs to earn about $137,000 a year to comfortably buy the median 45226 home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $100,156, so buying stretches a typical household.

Income to buy the median home
$137,000
a year, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate
Estimated monthly payment
$3,199
principal, interest, tax, and insurance on a $464,440 home
Median rent
$1,226
a month, across all home sizes

Where the monthly payment goes

Principal & interest$2,368
Property tax$676
Homeowners insurance$155

Assumes a 20% down payment, a 6.6% 30-year fixed rate, and a 28% share of income going to the payment. The rate is the 2026-07-23 30-year fixed average, series MORTGAGE30US from the St. Louis Fed, which publishes Freddie Mac's weekly survey. Against the median home value, property tax uses 45226's effective rate of 1.75%, and insurance is estimated at 0.4% of home value a year.

Renting versus buying

At today's prices and rents, renting stays cheaper than buying across the first 10 years here, so the case for buying rests on staying much longer or on prices rising faster than assumed. The chart tracks the running cost of each.

Cumulative cost of renting versus owning the median home, first 10 years. Illustrative estimate.

Who lives in 45226

45226 runs younger than the country, and households here run smaller than average.

Median age
37
younger than the U.S. median of 41
Residents 65 and older
14%
versus 18% nationally
Average household
2.1
below the U.S. average of 2.6

Residents by age

Under 1817%
18 to 3428%
35 to 4923%
50 to 6418%
65 and older14%

Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for 45226.


Who works in 45226, and how

Work in 45226 centers on professional & technical and retail trade. Unemployment is low, and employment has held roughly flat.

Work from home
18%
above the national average
Unemployment
1.7%
below the national average
Job growth
+1.2%
/y 2019-2023, slower than the national pace

Largest industries

Professional & technical20%
Retail trade17%
Health care & social13%
Manufacturing10%
Education7%

How people get to work

  • Drive or carpool 78%
  • Work from home 18%
  • Transit, walk, or bike 4%

Life in 45226

45226 has more restaurants and bars per resident than 84% of zip codes and more parkland per resident than 99% of zip codes. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of 45226 and thins out in others, which the map shows.

Places to eat and drink
47
restaurants, bars, and fast food, about 82.3 per 10,000 residents, more than 84% of zip codes
Parkland
392 acres
about 68.7 acres per 1,000 residents, more than 99% of zip codes

What the weather is like in 45226, month by month

45226 sees roughly 61 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 89 degrees. January highs sit near 44, with lows near 23. The comfortable stretch runs May, June, and August through October.

Average daily high, mean, and low in degrees Fahrenheit, NOAA station data 2016 to 2025.
Show the monthly temperatures
MonthAvg highAvgAvg low
January44°33°23°
April69°54°41°
July89°76°65°
October72°57°45°

Flying in and out of 45226

Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International sits about 14 miles away. It is a medium hub and boarded 4.4 million passengers in 2025, with 99 nonstop destinations.

Nearest airport
CVG
Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International, about 14 miles
Airport size
Medium hub
50th-busiest in the US, 99 nonstop destinations
Average drive
19 min
from the area, with no traffic

The best schools in and around 45226

Schools across 45226 average a D, better than 9% of zip codes.

Top elementary schools

Top high schools

Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every 45226 school and its grade on SchoolGrade.


45226 measure by measure

Cards are ordered by how much each measure matters to you, so the ones you weighted highest come first. Expand to see every measure. Percentages compare 45226 against the other 33,109 zip codes.


Common questions about living in 45226

Is 45226 a good place to live?

Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, 45226 ranks 9,871st of 33,110 zip codes. It scores highest on an educated workforce, population health, and cheap car insurance, and lowest on property taxes and noise. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.

Is 45226 expensive to live in?

The median home is worth $464,440. The overall cost of living runs about 2% below the national average. Set against a $100,156 median income, cost of living beats 88% of zip codes.

Is 45226 safe?

45226 is safer than 16% of zip codes. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $469 per resident a year.


Compare 45226 with other zip codes


Sources and methodology

Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to 45226. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in 45226 represents the same real quantity as a 60 anywhere else, and the ranking is a weighted average of those absolutes. The map colors come from a national scale calibrated against a population weighted random sample of 5,000 neighborhoods. That absolute scoring is what no other places-to-live ranking does: it puts a single neighborhood, a town, a metro, and a state on one scale, so the same 40 measures answer both which metro to move to and which street inside it to buy on. Read the full methodology.

45226 detail on BestNeighborhood maps:

  1. Walk Grade for 45226: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
  2. Noise in 45226: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
  3. Conservative vs liberal map of 45226: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
  4. Mobile and cell coverage in 45226: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.

45226 detail on related sites:

  1. CrimeGrade: neighborhood crime rates behind the crime safety score.
  2. ISPreports.org: provider by provider internet availability and advertised speeds.
  3. CoverageWatch: the car insurance premiums behind the cheap car insurance score.

Federal and public data:

  1. U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey: income, home value, rent, vacancy, commute time and mode, educational attainment, home age, age structure, household type, industry, and race.
  2. NOAA Global Surface Summary of the Day: the daily station record behind the monthly temperatures and the pleasant-day count.
  3. FAA Passenger Boarding Data: airport size and annual passenger counts.
  4. Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey: the 30-year fixed rate used in the cost-to-buy estimate.
  5. FBI Crime Data Explorer: reported offenses behind the tangible crime cost estimate.
  6. U.S. EPA Air Quality System: five year average air quality index.
  7. FEMA National Risk Index: expected annual loss from natural hazards.
  8. CDC PLACES: disease burden, preventable risk, and barriers to care.
  9. National Center for Education Statistics: school enrollment and assessment inputs behind the school grade.
  10. FCC National Broadband Map: internet and wireless availability.
  11. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: employment and job growth behind the local economy score.
  12. Religious activity uses a proprietary religious signal measurement.