Best PlacesYelm, WA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Yelm, 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.
Yelm ranks 1,201st of 2,098 U.S. cities on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on quiet by a wide margin, and cell coverage ranks lowest.
The best neighborhoods in Yelm
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.
Yelm's strengths and weaknesses
Where Yelm ranks high
- QuietBetter than 99% of cities
- Air qualityBetter than 95% of cities
- Local economyBetter than 91% of cities
- Heat safetyBetter than 88% of cities
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than 83% of cities
Where Yelm ranks low
- Cell coverageBetter than only 1% of cities
- Short commute36.4 minutes each way, better than only 4% of cities
- Internet speedBetter than only 5% of cities
- Housing crash safetyBetter than only 6% of cities
- State infrastructureBetter than only 9% of cities
What it costs to buy a home in Yelm
A household needs to earn about $117,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Yelm home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $93,165, 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 Yelm's effective rate of 0.73%, 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 Yelm
Yelm runs younger than the country.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Yelm.
Who works in Yelm, and how
Work in Yelm centers on health care & social and retail trade. Unemployment is low, and jobs are growing.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 84%
- Work from home 12%
- Transit, walk, or bike 4%
Life in Yelm
Yelm has more parkland per resident than 79% of cities. The coast is about 42 minutes away. That concentrates in some parts of Yelm and thins out in others, which the map shows.
What the weather is like in Yelm, month by month
Yelm sees roughly 89 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 81 degrees. January highs sit near 49, with lows near 33. The comfortable stretch runs May through September.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 49° | 40° | 33° |
| April | 62° | 49° | 37° |
| July | 81° | 67° | 52° |
| October | 63° | 51° | 41° |
Flying in and out of Yelm
Seattle-Tacoma International sits about 39 miles away. It is a large hub and boarded 25.4 million passengers in 2025, with 172 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Yelm
Schools across Yelm average a C+, better than 34% of cities.
Top middle schools
- Lakeridge Middle SchoolA · 60% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Yelm school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Yelm 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 Yelm against the other 2,097 cities.
Who Yelm suits
Families
Schools land around the 34th percentile and crime safety beats 74%.
Common questions about living in Yelm
Is Yelm a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Yelm ranks 1,201st of 2,098 cities. It scores highest on quiet, clean air, and a strong job market, and lowest on cell coverage and long commutes. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Yelm expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $449,992. The overall cost of living runs about 2% above the national average. Set against a $93,165 median income, cost of living beats 44% of cities.
Is Yelm safe?
Yes, Yelm is safer than 74% of cities. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $324 per resident a year.
What is the weather like in Yelm?
July highs average about 81 degrees, and January highs near 49 with lows near 33. That works out to about 89 pleasant days a year, more than 53% of cities.
Is Yelm good for families?
Schools beat 34% of cities, crime safety beats 74%, and childcare runs $1,375 a month.
Compare Yelm with other cities
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Yelm. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Yelm 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.
Yelm detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Yelm: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Yelm: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Yelm: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Yelm: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Yelm 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.