Best PlacesOceanside, WA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Oceanside, 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.
Oceanside ranks 16,926th of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on civic engagement by a wide margin, and an overheated housing market is the weak spot.
The best neighborhoods in Oceanside
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.
Oceanside's strengths and weaknesses
Where Oceanside ranks high
- Voter turnoutBetter than 99% of towns
- Air qualityBetter than 99% of towns
- Local economyBetter than 93% of towns
- Short commute18.8 minutes each way, better than 91% of towns
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than 86% of towns
Where Oceanside ranks low
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 1% of towns
- Cheap childcare$1,375 a month, better than only 7% of towns
- Disaster safetyBetter than only 8% of towns
- Low vacancyBetter than only 10% of towns
- State infrastructureBetter than only 13% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in Oceanside
A household needs to earn about $112,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Oceanside home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $73,091, 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 Oceanside's effective rate of 0.83%, 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 Oceanside
Oceanside 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 Oceanside.
Who works in Oceanside, and how
Work in Oceanside centers on retail trade and health care & social. Unemployment sits above the national rate, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 52%
- Work from home 34%
- Transit, walk, or bike 14%
Life in Oceanside
The coast is about 4 minutes away. Distance to the water changes a lot across Oceanside, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in Oceanside, month by month
Oceanside sees roughly 115 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 70 degrees. January highs sit near 52, with lows near 37. The comfortable stretch runs June through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 52° | 44° | 37° |
| April | 59° | 49° | 40° |
| July | 70° | 61° | 53° |
| October | 63° | 54° | 45° |
Flying in and out of Oceanside
Portland International sits about 90 miles away. It is a medium hub and boarded 9.1 million passengers in 2025, with 117 nonstop destinations.
Oceanside 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 Oceanside against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in Oceanside
Is Oceanside a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Oceanside ranks 16,926th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on civic engagement, clean air, and a strong job market, and lowest on an overheated housing market and childcare costs. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Oceanside expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $425,648. The overall cost of living runs about 4% below the national average. Set against a $73,091 median income, cost of living beats 64% of towns.
Is Oceanside safe?
Oceanside is safer than 51% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $426 per resident a year.
Compare Oceanside with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Oceanside. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Oceanside 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.
Oceanside detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Oceanside: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Oceanside: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Oceanside: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Oceanside: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Oceanside 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.