Wheaton Ranked Among Most Family Friendly Cities in Chicago Suburbs

Photo credit: Wheaton Park District Facebook page

The city of Wheaton is one of the best Chicago suburbs for families, according to a recent study by real estate blog Movoto.

Wheaton ranks No. 2 on the top 10 list, coming after Buffalo Grove at No. 1 and before Lisle at No. 3.

Here is what the blog had to say about its reasons for picking Wheaton:

From downtown Wheaton to the Danada area, this city is dotted with restaurants, boutiques, and things to do for parents and kids alike.

It was recently ranked the “healthiest of Chicago’s largest suburbs” by “Chicago Magazine” for its beautiful open areas (over 800 acres of land and 52 parks), bustling downtown, and low, low crime rate.

On top of all that, Wheaton not only has some of the best schools for your kids, but it also has one of the best libraries in the country.

Other top suburbs for families include: Lincolnshire, Itasca and Elmhurst.

Methodology

Researchers at Movoto used data from AreaVibes, GreatSchools.org, PlayScore.org and the U.S. Census to create the Top 10 list. They gathered places near Chicago with populations of 5,000 people or more.

Suburbs were researched in terms of the following family-friendly criteria:

• PlayScore
• GreatSchools.org Score
• Total crimes per 100K people
• Cost of living
• Unemployment rate
• Average commute time
• Median household income
• Median monthly housing costs

Each of the 90 places with complete data were ranked from 1 to 90 in each category. The ranks were averaged into what Movoto calls a Big Deal Score for each suburb. Lower Big Deal Scores are better, and the lowest 10 were named the best suburbs for families. See the full ranking of suburbs from Movoto.