Best PlacesHeather, WA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Heather, 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.
Heather ranks 37,119th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on quiet by a wide margin, and disaster risk is the weak spot.
The best neighborhoods in Heather
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.
Heather's strengths and weaknesses
Where Heather ranks high
- QuietBetter than 97% of towns
- Air qualityBetter than 95% of towns
- Voter turnoutBetter than 88% of towns
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than 86% of towns
- Nice weatherabout 115 pleasant days a year, better than 77% of towns
Where Heather ranks low
- Disaster safetyBetter than only 3% of towns
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 5% of towns
- Cheap childcare$1,375 a month, better than only 7% of towns
- Local economyBetter than only 9% of towns
- Low vacancyBetter than only 10% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in Heather
A household needs to earn about $46,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Heather home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is below the area's own median income of $71,923, so a typical household can afford the median home outright.
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 Heather's effective rate of 0.75%, and insurance is estimated at 0.4% of home value a year.
Who lives in Heather
Heather runs older than the country, and households here run smaller than average.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Heather.
Who works in Heather, and how
Work in Heather centers on health care & social and professional & technical. Unemployment runs well above the national rate, and employment has held roughly flat.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 56%
- Work from home 34%
- Transit, walk, or bike 11%
Life in Heather
The coast is about 1 minutes away. Distance to the water changes a lot across Heather, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in Heather, month by month
Heather sees roughly 115 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 70 degrees. January highs sit near 50, with lows near 38. The comfortable stretch runs June through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 50° | 43° | 38° |
| April | 58° | 49° | 41° |
| July | 70° | 61° | 54° |
| October | 62° | 53° | 45° |
Flying in and out of Heather
Seattle-Tacoma International sits about 96 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 25.4 million passengers in 2025, with 172 nonstop destinations.
Heather 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 Heather against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in Heather
Is Heather a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Heather ranks 37,119th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on quiet, clean air, and civic engagement, and lowest on disaster risk 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 Heather expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $178,800. The overall cost of living runs about 3% below the national average. Set against a $71,923 median income, cost of living beats 34% of towns.
Is Heather safe?
Heather is safer than 30% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $485 per resident a year.
Compare Heather with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Heather. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Heather 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.
Heather detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Heather: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Heather: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Heather: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Heather: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Heather 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.