Best PlacesEl Portal, FL Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around El Portal, 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.
El Portal ranks 12,349th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on transit by a wide margin, and car insurance costs are the weak spot.
The best neighborhoods in El Portal
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.
El Portal's strengths and weaknesses
Where El Portal ranks high
- TransitBetter than 99% of towns
- BikingBetter than 99% of towns
- State infrastructureBetter than 99% of towns
- WalkabilityBetter than 99% of towns
- Big-city accessBetter than 97% of towns
Where El Portal ranks low
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than only 1% of towns
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 1% of towns
- QuietBetter than only 4% of towns
- Disaster safetyBetter than only 6% of towns
- Crime safetyBetter than only 7% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in El Portal
A household needs to earn about $206,000 a year to comfortably buy the median El Portal home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $122,364, 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 El Portal's effective rate of 0.85%, 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 El Portal
El Portal's age mix sits close to the national median.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for El Portal.
Who works in El Portal, and how
Work in El Portal centers on health care & social and retail trade. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 67%
- Work from home 24%
- Transit, walk, or bike 10%
Life in El Portal
The coast is about 10 minutes away. Distance to the water changes a lot across El Portal, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in El Portal, month by month
El Portal sees roughly 100 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 92 degrees. January highs sit near 79, with lows near 59. The comfortable stretch runs November through March.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 79° | 68° | 59° |
| April | 87° | 77° | 69° |
| July | 92° | 84° | 77° |
| October | 88° | 80° | 73° |
Flying in and out of El Portal
Miami International sits about 7 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 26.2 million passengers in 2025, with 233 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around El Portal
Schools across El Portal average a B−, better than 61% of towns.
Top elementary schools
- Phyllis R. Miller Elementary SchoolB− · 43% proficient
- Miami Shores Elementary SchoolC+ · 40% proficient
- Hubert O. Sibley K-8 AcademyD+ · 22% proficient
Top middle schools
- Horace Mann Middle SchoolC− · 28% proficient
Top high schools
- Dr. Marvin Dunn Academy For Community Education.F · 10% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every El Portal school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
El Portal 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 El Portal against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in El Portal
Is El Portal a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, El Portal ranks 12,349th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on transit, biking, and state infrastructure, and lowest on car insurance costs and an overheated housing market. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is El Portal expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $782,486. The overall cost of living runs about 28% above the national average. Set against a $122,364 median income, cost of living beats 73% of towns.
Is El Portal safe?
El Portal is safer than 7% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $397 per resident a year.
Compare El Portal with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to El Portal. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in El Portal 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.
El Portal detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for El Portal: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in El Portal: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of El Portal: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in El Portal: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
El Portal 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.