Best PlacesLawrence, KS Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in the Lawrence metro, 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.
Photo by Ian Ballinger, CC BY-SA 4.0, via commons
Lawrence ranks 53rd of 387 U.S. metro areas on the BestNeighborhood index. It does not top any single list, but it lands above the national middle on an educated workforce and biking. The weaker spots are an overheated housing market, taxes, and civic engagement.
The best neighborhoods in the Lawrence metro
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 Lawrence
The towns and districts of the Lawrence metro, ranked by the BestNeighborhood standard score across every neighborhood in each, highest scoring first. Each note says how that part differs from the rest of the metro.
Eudora
Prices have run up less, incomes run higher, and local pay stretches further.
Baldwin City
More households have young kids, though biking is worse.
Downtown Lawrence
Transit reaches more jobs, though fewer residents vote.
Scores across Lawrence run from about the 20th to the 99th percentile nationally. The map is where that becomes a choice of area.
Lawrence's strengths and weaknesses
Lawrence ranks where it does because the parts of life that are hardest to change mostly work here. An educated workforce is the standout, in the top 2% of metro areas. Biking and low crime follow.
The drawbacks are real but narrow. An overheated housing market, taxes, and civic engagement hold the score down. The measures below break that down, and the map shows how much of it holds street by street.
Where Lawrence ranks high
- Educational attainmentBetter than 98% of metro areas
- BikingBetter than 96% of metro areas
- Crime safetyBetter than 95% of metro areas
- Health outlookBetter than 93% of metro areas
- TransitBetter than 92% of metro areas
Where Lawrence ranks low
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 19% of metro areas
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than only 22% of metro areas
- Voter turnoutBetter than only 24% of metro areas
- Low property taxBetter than only 29% of metro areas
- School gradeC+, better than only 32% of metro areas
What it costs to buy a home in Lawrence
A household needs to earn about $92,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Lawrence home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $79,042, 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 Lawrence's effective rate of 1.22%, 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 Lawrence
Lawrence runs younger 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 Lawrence.
Who works in Lawrence, and how
Work in Lawrence centers on education and health care & social. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 74%
- Work from home 15%
- Transit, walk, or bike 11%
Life in Lawrence
Lawrence has more parkland per resident than 85% of metro areas and more late-night spots per resident than 95% of metro areas. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Lawrence and thins out in others, which the map shows.
Is Lawrence growing, and who is moving in?
Lawrence has grown about 5% over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from Kansas City, MO.
Where new residents come from
Where people leaving Lawrence go
Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.
What the weather is like in Lawrence, month by month
Lawrence sees roughly 93 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 91 degrees. January highs sit near 41, with lows near 20. The comfortable stretch runs April, May, September, and October.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 41° | 29° | 20° |
| April | 70° | 55° | 43° |
| July | 91° | 79° | 68° |
| October | 72° | 57° | 45° |
Flying in and out of Lawrence
Kansas City International sits about 38 miles away. It is a medium hub and boarded 5.7 million passengers in 2025, with 104 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Lawrence
Schools across Lawrence average a C+, better than 32% of metro areas.
Top elementary schools
- Langston Hughes ElemA · 69% proficient
- Quail Run ElementaryA · 65% proficient
- Lecompton ElemB · 50% proficient
Top middle schools
- Lawrence Southwest Middle SchoolC · 34% proficient
- Eudora Middle SchoolC · 32% proficient
- Carbondale Attendance CenterC− · 29% proficient
Top high schools
- Lawrence Free State HighC+ · 38% proficient
- Eudora High SchoolC+ · 35% proficient
- Baldwin High SchoolC · 33% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Lawrence school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Lawrence 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 Lawrence against the other 386 metro areas.
Who Lawrence suits
Families
Schools land around the 32nd percentile and crime safety beats 95%.
Remote workers
Internet is fast and widely advertised and 15% already work from home.
Common questions about living in Lawrence
Is Lawrence a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Lawrence ranks 53rd of 387 metro areas. It scores highest on an educated workforce, biking, and low crime, and lowest on an overheated housing market and taxes. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Lawrence expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $333,574. The overall cost of living runs about 15% below the national average. Set against a $79,042 median income, cost of living beats 69% of metro areas.
Is Lawrence safe?
Yes, Lawrence is safer than 95% of metro areas. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $230 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Lawrence?
July highs average about 91 degrees, and January highs near 41 with lows near 20. That works out to about 93 pleasant days a year, more than 54% of metro areas.
What are the best neighborhoods in Lawrence?
Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Eudora, Baldwin City, and Downtown Lawrence. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.
Is Lawrence good for families?
Schools beat 32% of metro areas, crime safety beats 95%, and childcare runs $796 a month.
Is Lawrence good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 69% of metro areas, and the fastest advertised internet here beats 78% of metro areas. About 15% of workers already work from home.
Compare Lawrence with other metro areas
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Lawrence. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Lawrence 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.
Lawrence detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Lawrence: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Lawrence: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Lawrence: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Lawrence: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Lawrence 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.
- U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates Program: population growth and net migration behind the population-change section.
- 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.