3 NJ Beach Towns Are Among Best In Country To Live, Study Finds

Many people would never think about living by the beach beyond their daydreams. For some, it sounds like it would be expensive and tough to maintain. Plus, it’s just a different lifestyle. New Jersey’s different from most, though. The Jersey Shore offers an array of beaches and plenty of places to live.

WalletHub put together a list of the best beach cities and towns to live in ahead of this weekend's heat wave. It's certainly not a perfect list, but in using several factors the personal finance website came up with the best 161 “beach towns” to settle down into. Here are the three New Jersey beaches that made the cut:

• 36. Ocean City
• 126. Ventnor City
• 152. Asbury Park

The rankings don't indicate where the best beaches or views are — click here for those — but rather things like affordability, weather, safety, economy, quality of life, health and education. Other factors, like whether the beach has a large seasonal tourist attraction or whether climate change makes it too risky for a long-term investment, are up to you.

Asbury Park had both the highest housing costs and lowest median household income (adjusted for cost of living) of all the communities WalletHub looked at. Ventnor City had the highest foreclosure rate.

Education and health played well for many of the high-ranking Massachusetts communities. All three towns were in the top 100 in this category, as well as safety and quality of life.

Ocean City ranked 15th for education and health out of the 161 towns that were ranked. The island was 29th for quality of life and 33rd for safety. Ventnor was No. 26 for education and health, 49th for safety and 90th for quality of life. Asbury Park was 25th for education and health, 49th for quality of life and 53rd for safety.

Here are where all the beach towns ranked by WalletHub can be found.

Patch file photo