The Best Places to Live in Florida (2025)
Discover the best places and top-ranked cities to live in Florida.
Finding the best places to live in Florida, as well as its top-ranked cities, can help you achieve a best-fit destination to call home. Understanding what each city offers, and why people are moving to them, can greatly help you to make a more-informed and qualified decision upon your relocation to the sunshine state.
In determining the city rankings for the best places to live in Florida each year, popular publications such as U.S. News & World Report, Wallet Hub, Livability.com and others use a ranking methodology whereby Florida cities are ranked upon a handful of criteria and then assigned a total score. The cities which receive the highest overall scores are then listed as the top-rated cities. Let's now take a closer look at the criteria that each city is ranked against.
Best Places to Live Ranking Criteria
The following are common ranking criteria used when evaluating Florida's best places to live. Whether you're moving to Florida as a young professional, relocating your family for new adventures, or seeking a top city for your retirement years, knowing the cities which are top-rated in these criteria can be helpful in your relocation process.Quality of Life
Quality of life examines the happiness of local residents in terms of proximity to top hospitals, quality of education, crime rates, public transportation and commute times and overall resident well-being.Housing Affordability
Housing affordability compares annual household income for a given area against its annual cost of living. This includes cost of living expenses such as housing, utilities, food, transportation and healthcare.Employment
Employment looks at the strength of local job markets, local unemployment rates and average salaries for a given area.City Desirability
City desirability is simply a measure of where people would most like to live, in the entire county, based upon a city’s overall appeal.Net Migration
Net migration tracks the growth and/or decline rates of cities based upon the net number of people moving to, or away from, a given city.
| # | City Name | Average Home Price | Average Age |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Naples, FL | $574K | 65.4 |
| 2 | Sarasota, FL | $434K | 48.9 |
| 3 | Pensacola, FL | $255K | 36.8 |
| 4 | Tampa, FL | $374K | 35.9 |
| 5 | Fort Myers, FL | $343K | 40.6 |
| 6 | Melbourne, FL | $364K | 41.4 |
| 7 | Jacksonville, FL | $289K | 35.9 |
| 8 | Orlando, FL | $379K | 33.9 |
| 9 | Tallahassee, FL | $284K | 27.2 |
| 10 | Ocala, FL | $270K | 37.3 |
Discover Florida
Click below to discover Florida's west and east coasts as well as how expensive it is to live in the sunshine state.
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How Expensive is Living in Florida?
