Pullen Park
We constantly talk about Raleigh’s many accolades and reasons to love our city, and Forbes has bestowed us with a pretty great new title: “Best City To Raise A Family“. We’ve got all of the attractiveness for businesses and new graduates, but this is a great reason to consider Raleigh and the Triangle area as your long-term home. We are blessed with quality schools, low crime, lots of oak trees and a low cost of living relative to its residents’ rising level of income. Much to our delight, about two-thirds of locals own their own homes.
Forbes wanted a logical, objective set of criteria with which to measure family friendliness. They ranked America’s 100 largest metro areas on median household income, Cost of Living Index, housing affordability, the percentage of residents who own their homes, average commuting delays, crime rate rankings and local school quality. Forbes acknowledges Raleigh’s frequent appearances on “Best” lists over the past few years, and points to the city’s growth with a minimal amount of growing pains (rising prices, congestion) as one of the reasons we continue to be recognized on these lists. Our median household income ($58,000) ranks in the top 30 among the nation’s 100 largest metros, while the local cost of living still ranks in the bottom 30. Commuting delays, always a factor in missing quality family time, are eighth-lowest in the country, according to the Texas Transportation Institute. Taking all of this data into account, Forbes has deemed Raleigh the #1 city in the country to raise a family, and we could not agree more!