Best PlacesBull Run, VA Best Neighborhoods

2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026

Every neighborhood in and around Bull Run, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. The coast is close, and the measures below put a number on how close. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.

See the map of best neighborhoods

Bull Run ranks 12,074th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on biking by a wide margin, and civic engagement ranks lowest.

#12,074
of 50,333 towns
BestNeighborhood rank
Defaults weight crime safety, affordability, schools, and weather highest: the things hardest to change after a move
N/A
of 50,333 towns
Your rank
Set your priorities to see your rank

The best neighborhoods in Bull Run

Map of the best neighborhoods in the Bull Run 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.

Bull Run's strengths and weaknesses

Top 3%Biking
Top 3%Walkability
Top 3%Cell coverage
Each measure against the national median. Bars to the right beat the median; bars to the left fall short. Percentiles compare Bull Run with other towns.

Where Bull Run ranks high

  • BikingBetter than 98% of towns
  • WalkabilityBetter than 98% of towns
  • Cell coverageBetter than 98% of towns
  • TransitBetter than 98% of towns
  • Big-city accessBetter than 96% of towns

Where Bull Run ranks low

  • Voter turnoutBetter than only 3% of towns
  • QuietBetter than only 5% of towns
  • Cheap childcare$1,333 a month, better than only 8% of towns
  • Healthcare accessBetter than only 13% of towns
  • Housing crash safetyBetter than only 14% of towns

What it costs to buy a home in Bull Run

A household needs to earn about $120,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Bull Run home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $90,836, so buying stretches a typical household.

Income to buy the median home
$120,000
a year, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate
Estimated monthly payment
$2,789
principal, interest, tax, and insurance on a $445,209 home
Median rent
$1,947
a month, across all home sizes

Where the monthly payment goes

Principal & interest$2,270
Property tax$371
Homeowners insurance$148

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 Bull Run's effective rate of 1.00%, and insurance is estimated at 0.4% of home value a year.

Renting versus buying

At today's prices, buying tends to cost more than renting for about the first 9 years, then pulls ahead as rent keeps rising and the mortgage builds equity. 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 Bull Run

Bull Run runs younger than the country.

Median age
34
younger than the U.S. median of 41
Residents 65 and older
7%
versus 18% nationally
Average household
2.8
near the U.S. average of 2.6

Residents by age

Under 1824%
18 to 3428%
35 to 4921%
50 to 6419%
65 and older7%

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


Who works in Bull Run, and how

Work in Bull Run centers on retail trade and professional & technical. Unemployment is low, and jobs are growing.

Work from home
11%
below the national average
Unemployment
3.3%
below the national average
Job growth
+7.7%
/y 2019-2023, faster than the national pace

Largest industries

Retail trade14%
Professional & technical12%
Health care & social10%
Other services9%
Construction9%

How people get to work

  • Drive or carpool 86%
  • Work from home 11%
  • Transit, walk, or bike 3%

Life in Bull Run

Bull Run has more restaurants and bars per resident than 86% of towns and more parkland per resident than 82% of towns. The coast is about 25 minutes away. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Bull Run and thins out in others, which the map shows.

Places to eat and drink
129
restaurants, bars, and fast food, about 67.1 per 10,000 residents, more than 86% of towns
Coffee shops
10
about 5.2 per 10,000 residents, more than 80% of towns
Parkland
59 acres
about 3.1 acres per 1,000 residents, more than 82% of towns
To the coast
25 min
drive to the nearest ocean beaches

What the weather is like in Bull Run, month by month

Bull Run sees roughly 78 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 91 degrees. January highs sit near 47, with lows near 23. The comfortable stretch runs April through June, September, and October.

Average daily high, mean, and low in degrees Fahrenheit, NOAA station data 2016 to 2025.
Show the monthly temperatures
MonthAvg highAvgAvg low
January47°34°23°
April72°57°43°
July91°78°67°
October73°59°46°

Flying in and out of Bull Run

Washington Dulles International sits about 12 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 13.9 million passengers in 2025, with 200 nonstop destinations.

Nearest airport
IAD
Washington Dulles International, about 12 miles
Airport size
Large hub
22nd-busiest in the US, 200 nonstop destinations
Average drive
17 min
from the area, with no traffic

The best schools in and around Bull Run

Schools across Bull Run average a B, better than 68% of towns.

Top elementary schools

Top middle schools

Top high schools

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


Bull Run 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 Bull Run against the other 50,332 towns.


Common questions about living in Bull Run

Is Bull Run a good place to live?

Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Bull Run ranks 12,074th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on biking, walkability, and cell coverage, and lowest on civic engagement and noise. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.

Is Bull Run expensive to live in?

The median home is worth $445,209. The overall cost of living runs about 14% above the national average. Set against a $90,836 median income, cost of living beats 42% of towns.

Is Bull Run safe?

Bull Run is safer than 40% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $368 per resident a year.


Compare Bull Run with other towns


Sources and methodology

Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Bull Run. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Bull Run 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.

Bull Run detail on BestNeighborhood maps:

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

Bull Run 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.