Best PlacesRacine, WI Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in the Racine 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 Jules Verne Times Two, CC BY-SA 4.0, via commons
Racine ranks 146th 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 low disaster risk and cheap car insurance. The weaker spots are the schools, property taxes, and air quality.
The best neighborhoods in the Racine 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 Racine
The towns and districts of the Racine 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.
Rochester
Schools score higher, incomes run higher, and local pay stretches further.
Waterford & Tichigan
Crime runs lower, though fewer households have young kids.
Burlington
Biking is worse and transit reaches fewer jobs.
Franksville
More residents vote, though streets are more car-dependent.
Mount Pleasant
Fewer homes sit empty and prices have run up less.
Sturtevant & Union Grove
Caledonia
More adults hold degrees.
Downtown Racine
Homes cost less, though health care is harder to reach.
Racine shows why a single number is not enough. Some neighborhoods score in the bottom 7% of the country and others in the top 4%. Pick the area first, then the home.
Racine's strengths and weaknesses
Racine lands in the middle because its strengths and weaknesses roughly balance. Low disaster risk, cheap car insurance, and big-city access carry most of that.
The drawbacks are real but narrow. The schools, property taxes, and air quality hold the score down. The detail is below, and the map is where it turns into a choice of neighborhood rather than just a place.
Where Racine ranks high
- Disaster safetyBetter than 94% of metro areas
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than 91% of metro areas
- Big-city accessBetter than 90% of metro areas
- Voter turnoutBetter than 87% of metro areas
- WalkabilityBetter than 86% of metro areas
Where Racine ranks low
- School gradeD+, better than only 6% of metro areas
- Low property taxBetter than only 9% of metro areas
- Air qualityBetter than only 14% of metro areas
- Cheap childcare$1,303 a month, better than only 15% of metro areas
- QuietBetter than only 20% of metro areas
What it costs to buy a home in Racine
A household needs to earn about $76,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Racine home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is below the area's own median income of $84,837, so a typical household can afford the median home outright.
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 Racine's effective rate of 1.58%, and insurance is estimated at 0.4% of home value a year.
Renting versus buying
At today's prices, buying tends to cost more than renting for about the first 9 years, then pulls ahead as rent keeps rising and the mortgage builds equity. The chart tracks the running cost of each.
Who lives in Racine
Racine's age mix sits close to the national median.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Racine.
Who works in Racine, and how
Work in Racine centers on manufacturing 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 85%
- Work from home 11%
- Transit, walk, or bike 4%
Life in Racine
Racine has fewer places to eat and drink per resident than most metro areas and more parkland per resident than 95% of metro areas. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Racine and thins out in others, which the map shows.
Is Racine growing, and who is moving in?
Racine has grown about 2% over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from Milwaukee, WI.
Where new residents come from
Where people leaving Racine go
Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.
What the weather is like in Racine, month by month
Racine sees roughly 103 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 82 degrees. January highs sit near 32, with lows near 20. The comfortable stretch runs May through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 32° | 25° | 20° |
| April | 55° | 45° | 38° |
| July | 82° | 73° | 65° |
| October | 62° | 54° | 46° |
Flying in and out of Racine
General Mitchell International sits about 16 miles away. It is a medium hub and boarded 2.9 million passengers in 2025, with 66 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Racine
Schools across Racine average a D+, better than 6% of metro areas.
Top elementary schools
- Somers ElementaryB− · 40% proficient
- Jefferson Lighthouse ElementaryC+ · 38% proficient
- Gifford SchoolC · 33% proficient
Top middle schools
- Bullen MiddleD · 19% proficient
- Starbuck - An Ib World SchoolD− · 15% proficient
- Washington MiddleF · 13% proficient
Top high schools
- Walden Iii HighC · 30% proficient
- Case HighD · 23% proficient
- Bradford HighD− · 16% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Racine school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Racine 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 Racine against the other 386 metro areas.
Who Racine suits
Retirees
The weather beats 61% of metro areas and health care access beats 85%.
Common questions about living in Racine
Is Racine a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Racine ranks 146th of 387 metro areas. It scores highest on low disaster risk, cheap car insurance, and big-city access, and lowest on the schools and property taxes. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Racine expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $262,718. The overall cost of living runs about 10% below the national average. Set against a $84,837 median income, cost of living beats 70% of metro areas.
Is Racine safe?
Racine is safer than 47% of metro areas. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $359 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Racine?
July highs average about 82 degrees, and January highs near 32 with lows near 20. That works out to about 103 pleasant days a year, more than 61% of metro areas.
What are the best neighborhoods in Racine?
Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Rochester, Waterford & Tichigan, and Burlington. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.
Is Racine good for families?
Schools beat 6% of metro areas, crime safety beats 47%, and childcare runs $1,303 a month.
Is Racine good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 70% of metro areas, though advertised internet speeds beat only 23% of metro areas. About 11% of workers already work from home.
Compare Racine with other metro areas
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Racine. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Racine 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.
Racine detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Racine: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Racine: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Racine: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Racine: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Racine 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.