Best PlacesClarklake, MI Best Neighborhoods

2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026

Every neighborhood in and around Clarklake, 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

Clarklake ranks 9,154th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on health care access by a wide margin, and car insurance costs are the weak spot.

#9,154
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 Clarklake

Map of the best neighborhoods in the Clarklake 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.

Clarklake's strengths and weaknesses

Top 10%Health care access
Top 10%Civic engagement
Each measure against the national median. Bars to the right beat the median; bars to the left fall short. Percentiles compare Clarklake with other towns.

Where Clarklake ranks high

  • Healthcare accessBetter than 94% of towns
  • Voter turnoutBetter than 93% of towns
  • Crime safetyBetter than 88% of towns
  • Household income$104,752 median, better than 88% of towns
  • Cost of living vs incomeBetter than 85% of towns

Where Clarklake ranks low

  • Cheap car insuranceBetter than only 5% of towns
  • State fiscal healthBetter than only 22% of towns
  • Local economyBetter than only 26% of towns
  • State infrastructureBetter than only 29% of towns
  • Air qualityBetter than only 32% of towns

What it costs to buy a home in Clarklake

A household needs to earn about $83,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Clarklake home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is below the area's own median income of $104,752, so a typical household can afford the median home outright.

Income to buy the median home
$83,000
a year, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate
Estimated monthly payment
$1,945
principal, interest, tax, and insurance on a $313,388 home
Median rent
$963
a month, across all home sizes

Where the monthly payment goes

Principal & interest$1,598
Property tax$242
Homeowners insurance$104

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 Clarklake's effective rate of 0.93%, 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 Clarklake

Clarklake runs older than the country.

Median age
48
older than the U.S. median of 41
Residents 65 and older
27%
versus 18% nationally
Average household
2.4
below the U.S. average of 2.6

Residents by age

Under 1818%
18 to 3416%
35 to 4918%
50 to 6420%
65 and older27%

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


Who works in Clarklake, and how

Work in Clarklake centers on manufacturing and health care & social. Unemployment is low, and the job base is shrinking.

Work from home
12%
below the national average
Unemployment
2.8%
below the national average
Job growth
−13.1%
/y 2019-2023, slower than the national pace

Largest industries

Manufacturing20%
Health care & social12%
Education9%
Retail trade9%
Construction8%

How people get to work

  • Drive or carpool 85%
  • Work from home 12%
  • Transit, walk, or bike 3%

Life in Clarklake

The map and measures below break down dining, culture, and green space by neighborhood across Clarklake.


What the weather is like in Clarklake, month by month

Clarklake sees roughly 91 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 85 degrees. January highs sit near 34, with lows near 18. The comfortable stretch runs May through September.

Average daily high, mean, and low in degrees Fahrenheit, NOAA station data 2016 to 2025.
Show the monthly temperatures
MonthAvg highAvgAvg low
January34°26°18°
April61°47°35°
July85°73°60°
October65°53°42°

Flying in and out of Clarklake

The nearest airport, Eugene F Kranz Toledo Express, is about 46 miles away and is a small airport. The nearest major hub is Detroit Metro Wayne County, about 52 miles away.

Nearest airport
TOL
Eugene F Kranz Toledo Express, about 46 miles
Airport size
Nonhub
262nd-busiest in the US, 7 nonstop destinations
Average drive
66 min
from the area, with no traffic

The best schools in and around Clarklake

Schools across Clarklake average a C, better than 38% 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 Clarklake school and its grade on SchoolGrade.


Clarklake 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 Clarklake against the other 50,332 towns.


Common questions about living in Clarklake

Is Clarklake a good place to live?

Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Clarklake ranks 9,154th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on health care access, civic engagement, and low crime, and lowest on car insurance costs and state finances. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.

Is Clarklake expensive to live in?

The median home is worth $313,388. The overall cost of living runs about 2% below the national average. Set against a $104,752 median income, cost of living beats 85% of towns.

Is Clarklake safe?

Yes, Clarklake is safer than 88% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $225 per resident a year.


Compare Clarklake with other towns


Sources and methodology

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

Clarklake detail on BestNeighborhood maps:

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

Clarklake 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.