When trying to find the best places to live, it's always a good idea to compare cities; after all, when you go to buy a car or a house or any big ticket item, you usually try out a few models or visit a few homes before you decide. The same tactic applies to finding the best places to live - do it before you start planning your move.
Best Places to Live: How to Compare Cities
There are lots of tools out there, but here are some of my favorites:- Overall Comparison: Sperling's Best Places takes the comparison tool and adds in some commentary. Makes for an interesting read with some very solid facts. Great for an overview of the two cities. We used this tool when trying to decide where to live when moving to the East Bay in California.
- Crime Rates: AreaConnect.com provides a very easy and quick way to compare crime rates of two cities, then measures them both against the national statistics. The data is currently from FBI records of 2004, with an update using 2005 data to be available soon. Very informative.
- Cost of Living and Salary Comparison: Again, Sperling's has the best tool for comparing salaries and cost of living. This tool provides stats on food, housing, utilities, transportation and more. Great way to find out if your salary will measure up in the new city.
- Salary Comparison: SalaryExpert.com also has a great tool that compares two cities based on cost of living and your current salary. I tried it out for our next move and it worked really well. It also provides information for Canadian cities.
- Compare Schools: GreatSchools.net is a parent's dream in finding the best school. This tool lists schools in the city of your choice, providing extensive statistics on test scores and teacher and student ratios, including teacher's experience. The tool also allows you to compare two schools within the same city or from state to state. Highly recommend this site.
