Best PlacesPine Hills, CA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Pine Hills, 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.
Pine Hills ranks 32,279th 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 Pine Hills
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.
Pine Hills' strengths and weaknesses
Where Pine Hills ranks high
- QuietBetter than 94% of towns
- Household income$118,614 median, better than 93% of towns
- Big-city accessBetter than 93% of towns
- Health outlookBetter than 90% of towns
- Nice weatherabout 131 pleasant days a year, better than 86% of towns
Where Pine Hills ranks low
- Disaster safetyBetter than only 1% of towns
- Air qualityBetter than only 2% of towns
- Short commute45.4 minutes each way, better than only 2% of towns
- Cheap childcare$1,432 a month, better than only 5% of towns
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than only 8% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in Pine Hills
A household needs to earn about $146,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Pine Hills home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $118,614, 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 Pine Hills' effective rate of 0.61%, 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 Pine Hills
Pine Hills 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 Pine Hills.
Who works in Pine Hills, and how
Work in Pine Hills centers on public administration and education. Unemployment is close to the national rate, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 72%
- Work from home 24%
- Transit, walk, or bike 4%
Life in Pine Hills
The map and measures below break down dining, culture, and green space by neighborhood across Pine Hills.
What the weather is like in Pine Hills, month by month
Pine Hills sees roughly 131 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 93 degrees. January highs sit near 68, with lows near 35. The comfortable stretch runs April through November.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 68° | 51° | 35° |
| April | 76° | 58° | 42° |
| July | 93° | 74° | 56° |
| October | 85° | 64° | 47° |
Flying in and out of Pine Hills
San Diego International sits about 39 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 12.7 million passengers in 2025, with 121 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Pine Hills
Schools across Pine Hills average a C, better than 38% of towns.
Top high schools
- Julian HighC+ · 37% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Pine Hills school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Pine Hills 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 Pine Hills against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in Pine Hills
Is Pine Hills a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Pine Hills ranks 32,279th of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on quiet, high incomes, and big-city access, and lowest on disaster risk and air quality. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Pine Hills expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $571,441. The overall cost of living runs about 26% above the national average. Set against a $118,614 median income, cost of living beats 68% of towns.
Is Pine Hills safe?
Pine Hills is safer than 54% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $315 per resident a year.
Compare Pine Hills with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Pine Hills. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Pine Hills 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.
Pine Hills detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Pine Hills: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Pine Hills: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Pine Hills: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Pine Hills: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Pine Hills 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.