Best PlacesAlpine, NJ Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Alpine, 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.
Alpine ranks 969th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on big-city access by a wide margin, and state finances rank lowest.
The best neighborhoods in Alpine
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.
Alpine's strengths and weaknesses
Where Alpine ranks high
- Big-city accessBetter than 99% of towns
- Cost of living vs incomeBetter than 99% of towns
- Household income$233,600 median, better than 99% of towns
- Educational attainmentBetter than 99% of towns
- Health outlookBetter than 99% of towns
Where Alpine ranks low
- State fiscal healthBetter than only 1% of towns
- Cheap childcare$1,508 a month, better than only 3% of towns
- Nice weatherabout 58 pleasant days a year, better than only 5% of towns
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 10% of towns
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than only 14% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in Alpine
A household needs to earn about $432,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Alpine home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $233,600, so buying stretches a typical household.
Where the monthly payment goes
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 Alpine's effective rate of 1.15%, 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.
Who lives in Alpine
Alpine runs older than the country, and households here run larger than average.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Alpine.
Who works in Alpine, and how
Work in Alpine centers on health care & social and finance & insurance. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and employment has held roughly flat.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 74%
- Work from home 19%
- Transit, walk, or bike 7%
Life in Alpine
Alpine has more restaurants and bars per resident than 99% of towns. The coast is about 25 minutes away. That concentrates in some parts of Alpine and thins out in others, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in Alpine, month by month
Alpine sees roughly 58 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 90 degrees. January highs sit near 44, with lows near 26. The comfortable stretch runs May, June, September, and October.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 44° | 34° | 26° |
| April | 65° | 53° | 42° |
| July | 90° | 79° | 69° |
| October | 71° | 59° | 48° |
Flying in and out of Alpine
Laguardia sits about 13 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 16.3 million passengers in 2025, with 118 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Alpine
Schools across Alpine average an A−, better than 87% of towns.
Top elementary schools
- Pearls Hawthorne SchoolA+ · 82% proficient
- Ps 81 Robert J ChristenA+ · 75% proficient
- Hillside Elementary SchoolA · 69% proficient
Top middle schools
- Upper SchoolA · 65% proficient
- Demarest Middle SchoolA · 63% proficient
- Tenakill Middle SchoolA− · 55% proficient
Top high schools
- Hastings High SchoolA+ · 98% proficient
- Riverdale/kingsbridge Academy (ms/hs 141)A+ · 86% proficient
- Riverside High SchoolA · 77% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Alpine school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Alpine 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 Alpine against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in Alpine
Is Alpine a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Alpine ranks 969th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on big-city access, what local pay buys, and high incomes, and lowest on state finances and childcare costs. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Alpine expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $1,576,286. The overall cost of living runs about 27% above the national average. Set against a $233,600 median income, cost of living beats 100% of towns.
Is Alpine safe?
Alpine is safer than 44% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $219 per resident a year.
Compare Alpine with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Alpine. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Alpine 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.
Alpine detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Alpine: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Alpine: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Alpine: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Alpine: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Alpine detail on related sites:
- CrimeGrade: neighborhood crime rates behind the crime safety score.
- ISPreports.org: provider by provider internet availability and advertised speeds.
- CoverageWatch: the car insurance premiums behind the cheap car insurance score.
Federal and public data:
- 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.
- NOAA Global Surface Summary of the Day: the daily station record behind the monthly temperatures and the pleasant-day count.
- FAA Passenger Boarding Data: airport size and annual passenger counts.
- Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey: the 30-year fixed rate used in the cost-to-buy estimate.
- FBI Crime Data Explorer: reported offenses behind the tangible crime cost estimate.
- U.S. EPA Air Quality System: five year average air quality index.
- FEMA National Risk Index: expected annual loss from natural hazards.
- CDC PLACES: disease burden, preventable risk, and barriers to care.
- National Center for Education Statistics: school enrollment and assessment inputs behind the school grade.
- FCC National Broadband Map: internet and wireless availability.
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: employment and job growth behind the local economy score.
- Religious activity uses a proprietary religious signal measurement.
Your priorities
Move a slider to say how much a measure matters. Zero turns it off.