Best PlacesMount Desert, ME Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Mount Desert, 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.
Mount Desert ranks 5,236th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on good schools by a wide margin, and an overheated housing market is the weak spot.
The best neighborhoods in Mount Desert
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.
Mount Desert's strengths and weaknesses
Where Mount Desert ranks high
- School gradeA+, better than 99% of towns
- Voter turnoutBetter than 99% of towns
- Healthcare accessBetter than 98% of towns
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than 98% of towns
- Educational attainmentBetter than 97% of towns
Where Mount Desert ranks low
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 1% of towns
- State infrastructureBetter than only 9% of towns
- Low vacancyBetter than only 10% of towns
- Big-city accessBetter than only 14% of towns
- Disaster safetyBetter than only 21% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in Mount Desert
A household needs to earn about $127,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Mount Desert home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $92,526, 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 Mount Desert's effective rate of 0.66%, 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 Mount Desert
Mount Desert 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 Mount Desert.
Who works in Mount Desert, and how
Work in Mount Desert centers on education and professional & technical. Unemployment is low, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 78%
- Work from home 14%
- Transit, walk, or bike 8%
Life in Mount Desert
The coast is about 13 minutes away. Distance to the water changes a lot across Mount Desert, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in Mount Desert, month by month
Mount Desert sees roughly 76 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 79 degrees. January highs sit near 35, with lows near 16. The comfortable stretch runs June through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 35° | 25° | 16° |
| April | 53° | 42° | 32° |
| July | 79° | 67° | 58° |
| October | 61° | 51° | 41° |
Flying in and out of Mount Desert
The nearest airport, Hancock County/Bar Harbor, is about 7 miles away and is a small airport. The nearest major hub is General Edward Lawrence Logan International, about 192 miles away.
The best schools in and around Mount Desert
Schools across Mount Desert average an A+, better than 99% of towns.
Top elementary schools
- Conners-emerson SchoolA+ · 97% proficient
- Mt Desert Elementary SchoolA+ · 94% proficient
- Pemetic Elementary SchoolA+ · 88% proficient
Top high schools
- Mt Desert Island High SchoolA+ · 98% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Mount Desert school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Mount Desert 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 Mount Desert against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in Mount Desert
Is Mount Desert a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Mount Desert ranks 5,236th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on good schools, civic engagement, and health care access, and lowest on an overheated housing market and state infrastructure. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Mount Desert expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $496,320. The overall cost of living runs about 20% above the national average. Set against a $92,526 median income, cost of living beats 43% of towns.
Is Mount Desert safe?
Yes, Mount Desert is safer than 62% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $262 per resident a year.
Compare Mount Desert with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Mount Desert. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Mount Desert 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.
Mount Desert detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Mount Desert: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Mount Desert: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Mount Desert: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Mount Desert: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Mount Desert 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.