Best PlacesYolo, CA Best Neighborhoods
2026–2027 edition · Data updated July 2026
Every neighborhood in and around Yolo, scored on 40 measures of daily life and ranked to fit what matters to you. Local pay runs high here, and housing takes the biggest bite out of it. To work out which city fits you best, start with the best places to live tool.
Yolo ranks 29,332nd of 50,333 U.S. towns on the BestNeighborhood index. It scores highest on high incomes by a wide margin, and childcare costs are the weak spot.
The best neighborhoods in Yolo
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.
Yolo's strengths and weaknesses
Where Yolo ranks high
- Household income$118,590 median, better than 93% of towns
- Big-city accessBetter than 92% of towns
- Nice weatherabout 146 pleasant days a year, better than 91% of towns
- Health outlookBetter than 85% of towns
- Cell coverageBetter than 79% of towns
Where Yolo ranks low
- Cheap childcare$1,550 a month, better than only 2% of towns
- Local economyBetter than only 3% of towns
- Voter turnoutBetter than only 4% of towns
- Low income/sales/gas taxBetter than only 8% of towns
- Heat safetyBetter than only 9% of towns
What it costs to buy a home in Yolo
A household needs to earn about $165,000 a year to comfortably buy the median Yolo home, at 20% down and today's 30-year rate. That runs well above the area's median income of $118,590, 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 Yolo's effective rate of 0.77%, 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 Yolo
Yolo runs younger than the country, and households here run larger than average.
Residents by age
Racial and ethnic makeup has its own map. See the race and diversity map for Yolo.
Who works in Yolo, and how
Work in Yolo centers on health care & social and manufacturing. Unemployment runs well above the national rate, and the job base is shrinking.
Largest industries
How people get to work
- Drive or carpool 71%
- Work from home 16%
- Transit, walk, or bike 13%
Life in Yolo
The map and measures below break down dining, culture, and green space by neighborhood across Yolo.
What the weather is like in Yolo, month by month
Yolo sees roughly 146 pleasant days a year. July highs average about 97 degrees. January highs sit near 59, with lows near 39. The comfortable stretch runs April through June, September, and October.
Show the monthly temperatures
| Month | Avg high | Avg | Avg low |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 59° | 49° | 39° |
| April | 76° | 61° | 46° |
| July | 97° | 77° | 60° |
| October | 82° | 65° | 48° |
Flying in and out of Yolo
Sacramento International sits about 12 miles away. It is a medium hub and boarded 6.8 million passengers in 2025, with 85 nonstop destinations.
The best schools in and around Yolo
Schools across Yolo average a C, better than 34% of towns.
Top high schools
- Woodland Senior HighC+ · 40% proficient
Grades come from K-12 test scores, with scores projected for schools missing data. See every Yolo school and its grade on SchoolGrade.
Yolo 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 Yolo against the other 50,332 towns.
Common questions about living in Yolo
Is Yolo a good place to live?
Using BestNeighborhood's default rankings, Yolo ranks 29,332nd of 50,333 towns. It scores highest on high incomes, big-city access, and the weather, and lowest on childcare costs and a weak job market. How good it is for you depends on which of those you weight most, which the map lets you set.
Is Yolo expensive to live in?
The median home is worth $632,542. The overall cost of living runs about 20% above the national average. Set against a $118,590 median income, cost of living beats 72% of towns.
Is Yolo safe?
Yolo is safer than 10% of towns. Safety varies a lot by neighborhood. Crime costs an estimated $620 per resident a year.
Compare Yolo with other towns
Sources and methodology
Every measure on this page is scored for each neighborhood, then rolled up to Yolo. Scores are absolute rather than ranked, which means a 60 in Yolo 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.
Yolo detail on BestNeighborhood maps:
- Walk Grade for Yolo: walkability, transit, and biking, measured on the real street network rather than by straight line distance.
- Noise in Yolo: road, rail, and aviation sound modeling calibrated against federal ground truth measurements.
- Conservative vs liberal map of Yolo: precinct level election results apportioned to neighborhoods.
- Mobile and cell coverage in Yolo: carrier by carrier coverage behind the cell score.
Yolo 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.