Best PlacesStaunton, VA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in the Staunton 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 Boston Public Library, CC BY 2.0, via commons
Staunton ranks 89th 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 cheap car insurance and tree cover. The weaker spots are walkability, state finances, and biking.
The best neighborhoods in the Staunton 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 Staunton
The towns and districts of the Staunton 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.
Weyers Cave
Prices have run up less, crime runs lower, and fewer homes sit empty.
Stuarts Draft
Local pay stretches further, though fewer households have young kids.
Verona & Mount Sidney
Incomes run higher and more adults hold degrees.
Churchville & Swoope
It is quieter and tree cover is thicker.
Downtown Staunton
Scores close to Churchville & Swoope, except that streets are more walkable here.
Waynesboro
Schools score lower.
Greenville
Fewer residents vote and biking is worse.
Staunton shows why a single number is not enough. Some neighborhoods score in the bottom 11% of the country and others in the top 8%. Pick the area first, then the home.
Staunton's strengths and weaknesses
Staunton ranks where it does because the parts of life that are hardest to change mostly work here. Cheap car insurance, tree cover, and good schools carry most of that.
The drawbacks are real but narrow. Walkability, state finances, and biking hold the score down. The measures below break that down, and the map shows how much of it holds street by street.
Where Staunton ranks high
- Cheap car insuranceBetter than 92% of metro areas
- Tree shadeBetter than 91% of metro areas
- School gradeB+, better than 89% of metro areas
- Voter turnoutBetter than 88% of metro areas
- Healthcare accessBetter than 86% of metro areas
Where Staunton ranks low
- WalkabilityBetter than only 13% of metro areas
- State fiscal healthBetter than only 13% of metro areas
- BikingBetter than only 15% of metro areas
- Health outlookBetter than only 24% of metro areas
- Cell coverageBetter than only 26% of metro areas
What it costs to buy a home in Staunton
A household needs to earn about $73,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Staunton home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That is below the area's own median income of $77,344, 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 Staunton's effective rate of 0.55%, 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 Staunton
Staunton 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 Staunton.
Who works in Staunton, and how
Work in Staunton centers on health care & social and manufacturing. Unemployment is low, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 87%
- Work from home 9%
- Transit, walk, or bike 4%
Life in Staunton
Staunton has fewer places to eat and drink per resident than most metro areas and more parkland per resident than 76% of metro areas. Dining, parks, and nightlife concentrates in some parts of Staunton and thins out in others, which the map shows.
Is Staunton growing, and who is moving in?
Staunton has grown about 8% over the last decade. The largest inbound stream comes from Harrisonburg, VA.
Where new residents come from
Where people leaving Staunton go
Move counts are the latest county-to-county migration flows, each county grouped into its metro.
What the weather is like in Staunton, month by month
Staunton sees roughly 81 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 87 degrees. January highs sit near 44, with lows near 24. The comfortable stretch runs May through October.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 44° | 34° | 24° |
| April | 68° | 54° | 42° |
| July | 87° | 75° | 64° |
| October | 70° | 56° | 45° |
Flying in and out of Staunton
The nearest airport, Shenandoah Valley Regional, is about 12 miles away and is a small airport. The nearest major hub is Washington Dulles International, about 103 miles away.
The best schools in and around Staunton
Schools across Staunton average a B+, better than 89% of metro areas.
Top elementary schools
- Riverheads ElementaryA · 69% proficient
- Edward G. Clymore ElementaryA · 62% proficient
- Churchville ElementaryA− · 57% proficient
Top middle schools
- Stuarts Draft MiddleA · 64% proficient
- S. Gordon Stewart MiddleA · 61% proficient
- Beverley Manor MiddleA · 59% proficient
Top high schools
- Wilson Memorial HighA · 75% proficient
- Buffalo Gap HighA · 73% proficient
- Stuarts Draft HighA · 72% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Staunton school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Staunton 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 Staunton against the other 386 metro areas.
Who Staunton suits
Common questions about living in Staunton
Is Staunton a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Staunton ranks 89th of 387 metro areas. It scores highest on cheap car insurance, tree cover, and good schools, and lowest on walkability and state finances. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Staunton expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $287,547. The overall cost of living runs about 13% below the national average. Set against a $77,344 median income, cost of living beats 50% of metro areas.
Is Staunton safe?
Yes, Staunton is safer than 84% of metro areas. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $266 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Staunton?
July highs average about 87 degrees, and January highs near 44 with lows near 24. That works out to about 81 pleasant days a year, more than 41% of metro areas.
What are the best neighborhoods in Staunton?
Using the default rankings, the highest-scoring areas are Weyers Cave, Stuarts Draft, and Verona & Mount Sidney. The ranked list and the re-weightable map above let you re-sort them for your own priorities.
Is Staunton good for families?
Schools beat 89% of metro areas, crime safety beats 84%, and childcare runs $807 a month.
Is Staunton good for remote workers?
Cost of living against local pay beats 50% of metro areas, though advertised internet speeds beat only 40% of metro areas. About 9% of workers already work from home.
Compare Staunton with other metro areas
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Staunton. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Staunton 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.
Staunton detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Staunton: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Staunton: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Staunton: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Staunton: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Staunton 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.