Best PlacesKitty Fork, NC Best Neighborhoods

2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026

Every neighborhood in and around Kitty Fork, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. This page is for people who live here or already know they want to. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.

See the map of best neighborhoods

Kitty Fork ranks 31,978th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on state finances by a wide margin, and disaster risk is the weak spot.

#31,978
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 Kitty Fork

Map of the best neighborhoods in the Kitty Fork 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.

Kitty Fork's strengths and weaknesses

Top 10%State finances
Each measure against the national median. Bars to the right beat the median; bars to the left fall short. Percentiles compare Kitty Fork with other towns.

Where Kitty Fork ranks high

  • State fiscal healthBetter than 91% of towns
  • Cheap childcare$596 a month, better than 79% of towns
  • Cheap car insuranceBetter than 78% of towns
  • School gradeB, better than 78% of towns
  • Tree shadeBetter than 73% of towns

Where Kitty Fork ranks low

  • Disaster safetyBetter than only 6% of towns
  • Healthcare accessBetter than only 18% of towns
  • Heat safetyBetter than only 22% of towns
  • Educational attainmentBetter than only 23% of towns
  • Nice weatherabout 69 pleasant days a year, better than only 24% of towns

What it costs to buy a home in Kitty Fork

A household needs to earn about $56,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Kitty Fork home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is below the area's own median income of $60,093, so a typical household can afford the median home outright.

Income to buy the median home
$56,000
a year, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate
Estimated monthly payment
$1,295
principal, interest, tax, and insurance on a $211,660 home
Median rent
$748
a month, across all home sizes

Where the monthly payment goes

Principal & interest$1,079
Property tax$146
Homeowners insurance$71

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 Kitty Fork's effective rate of 0.82%, 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 Kitty Fork

Kitty Fork's age mix sits close to the national median.

Median age
42
older than the U.S. median of 41
Residents 65 and older
19%
versus 18% nationally
Average household
2.6
near the U.S. average of 2.6

Residents by age

Under 1822%
18 to 3420%
35 to 4919%
50 to 6420%
65 and older19%

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


Who works in Kitty Fork, and how

Work in Kitty Fork centers on education and health care & social. Unemployment is low, and jobs are growing.

Work from home
2%
below the national average
Unemployment
2.7%
below the national average
Job growth
+1.5%
/y 2019-2023, slower than the national pace

Largest industries

Education16%
Health care & social16%
Retail trade13%
Manufacturing12%
Other services8%

How people get to work

  • Drive or carpool 93%
  • Work from home 2%
  • Transit, walk, or bike 5%

Life in Kitty Fork

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


What the weather is like in Kitty Fork, month by month

Kitty Fork sees roughly 69 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 91 degrees. January highs sit near 55, with lows near 36. The comfortable stretch runs March through May, 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
January55°45°36°
April76°63°53°
July91°80°73°
October77°65°56°

Flying in and out of Kitty Fork

The nearest airport, Fayetteville Regional/Grannis Field, is about 29 miles away and is a small airport. The nearest major hub is Raleigh-Durham International, about 60 miles away.

Nearest airport
FAY
Fayetteville Regional/Grannis Field, about 29 miles
Airport size
Nonhub
201st-busiest in the US, 8 nonstop destinations
Average drive
41 min
from the area, with no traffic

The best schools in and around Kitty Fork

Schools across Kitty Fork average a B, better than 78% 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 Kitty Fork school and its grade on SchoolGrade.


Kitty Fork 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 Kitty Fork against the other 50,332 towns.


Common questions about living in Kitty Fork

Is Kitty Fork a good place to live?

Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Kitty Fork ranks 31,978th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on state finances, affordable childcare, and cheap car insurance, and lowest on disaster risk and thin health care access. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.

Is Kitty Fork expensive to live in?

The median home is worth $211,660. The overall cost of living runs about 18% below the national average. Set against a $60,093 median income, cost of living beats 30% of towns.

Is Kitty Fork safe?

Kitty Fork is safer than 43% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $374 per resident a year.


Compare Kitty Fork with other towns


Sources and methodology

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

Kitty Fork detail on BestNeighborhood maps:

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

Kitty Fork 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.