Best PlacesDearborn, MI Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Dearborn, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. The averages are not the whole story, and the strongest areas score well above them. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.
Dearborn ranks 374th of 445 U.S. cities on the BestNeighborhood index. It ranks low mainly on car insurance costs and the cost of living against local pay. It does better on walkability, which keeps it off the bottom.
The best neighborhoods in Dearborn
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.
The best areas in Dearborn
The parts of Dearborn, ranked by the BestNeighborhood standard score across every neighborhood, highest scoring first. Each note says how that part differs from the rest of the city.
Dearborn Hills
More adults hold degrees, incomes run higher, and local pay stretches further.
Snow Woods
Prices have run up less and crime runs lower.
Southwestern Outer Drive & West Downtown Dearborn
Fewer homes sit empty, though fewer households have young kids.
Fairlane Town Center
Health outcomes score higher and health care is easier to reach.
Northeastern Dearborn
Streets are more walkable, though fewer residents vote.
Northern Dearborn
East Downtown Dearborn
Tree cover is thinner and it is noisier.
Scores across Dearborn run from about the 6th to the 86th percentile nationally. The map is where that becomes a choice of area.
Dearborn's strengths and weaknesses
Dearborn ranks near the bottom because several of the basics fall short at once. Walkability, heat safety, and low disaster risk carry most of that.
The weak spots are broad rather than narrow: car insurance costs, the cost of living against local pay, and a weak job market all drag on the score. Those are area averages, and the map below shows which parts run well above them.
Where Dearborn ranks high
- WalkabilityBetter than 89% of cities
- Heat safetyBetter than 86% of cities
- Disaster safetyBetter than 84% of cities
- Cheap childcare$834 a month, better than 81% of cities
- Short commute21.7 minutes each way, better than 75% of cities
Where Dearborn ranks low
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than only 3% of cities
- Cost of living vs incomeBetter than only 7% of cities
- Local economyBetter than only 8% of cities
- Health outlookBetter than only 9% of cities
- Low property taxBetter than only 10% of cities
What it costs to buy a home in Dearborn
A household needs to earn about $69,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Dearborn home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is only a little above the area's median income of $65,802; the gap is small, which keeps homes within reach of local pay.
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 Dearborn's effective rate of 1.60%, 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 7 years, then pulls ahead as rent keeps rising and the mortgage builds equity. The chart tracks the running cost of each.
Who lives in Dearborn
Dearborn runs younger 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 Dearborn.
Who works in Dearborn, and how
Work in Dearborn centers on manufacturing and retail trade. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and employment has held roughly flat.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 84%
- Work from home 12%
- Transit, walk, or bike 4%
Life in Dearborn
Dearborn has more restaurants and bars per resident than 80% of cities and more parkland per resident than 87% of cities. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Dearborn and thins out in others, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in Dearborn, month by month
Dearborn sees roughly 68 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 86 degrees. January highs sit near 36, with lows near 20. The comfortable stretch runs May through October.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 36° | 28° | 20° |
| April | 62° | 49° | 38° |
| July | 86° | 75° | 64° |
| October | 67° | 55° | 45° |
Flying in and out of Dearborn
Detroit Metro Wayne County sits about 10 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 16.3 million passengers in 2025, with 168 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Dearborn
Schools across Dearborn average a B−, better than 72% of cities.
Top elementary schools
- Howard Elementary SchoolB · 47% proficient
- Haigh Elementary SchoolB · 45% proficient
- Duvall Elementary SchoolB− · 42% proficient
Top middle schools
- Dearborn Stem Middle SchoolA+ · 83% proficient
- Bryant Middle SchoolC · 34% proficient
- Stout Middle SchoolC− · 28% proficient
Top high schools
- Henry Ford Early CollegeB− · 45% proficient
- Dearborn High SchoolC · 35% proficient
- Henry Ford Early Collegeadvanced ManufacturingC · 32% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Dearborn school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Dearborn 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 Dearborn against the other 444 cities.
Who Dearborn suits
Retirees
Set weather, quiet, and health care weights on the map to test the fit.
Common questions about living in Dearborn
Is Dearborn a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Dearborn ranks 374th of 445 cities. It scores highest on walkability, heat safety, and low disaster risk, and lowest on car insurance costs and the cost of living against local pay. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Dearborn expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $236,398. The overall cost of living runs about 2% below the national average. Set against a $65,802 median income, cost of living beats 7% of cities.
Is Dearborn safe?
Dearborn is safer than 23% of cities. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $557 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Dearborn?
July highs average about 86 degrees, and January highs near 36 with lows near 20. That works out to about 68 pleasant days a year, more than 17% of cities.
What are the best neighborhoods in Dearborn?
Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Dearborn Hills, Snow Woods, and Southwestern Outer Drive & West Downtown Dearborn. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.
Is Dearborn good for families?
Schools beat 72% of cities, crime safety beats 23%, and childcare runs $834 a month.
Is Dearborn good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 7% of cities, though advertised internet speeds beat only 25% of cities. About 12% of workers already work from home.
Compare Dearborn with other cities
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Dearborn. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Dearborn 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.
Dearborn detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Dearborn: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Dearborn: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Dearborn: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Dearborn: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Dearborn 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.