These Are The 10 Best Small Towns In Rhode Island For 2018

You’ve seen these lists before: Best places to live in Rhode Island, Most Beautiful Downtowns, etc., etc. But all of them focus on major cities and towns in the Ocean State and no one pays attention to the little guy.

Well, that’s all about to change as we put together a list of the best small towns in Rhode Island based on numbers–not opinions or hearsay.

We’ll dive right into our methodology in the next section; but first, we thought you might just want to know which places in Rhode Island ranked the based–you know, based on science.

Here are the 10 Best Small Towns To Live in Rhode Island for 2018:

1. Watch Hill
2. Hope Valley (Photos)
3. Weekapaug
4. Narragansett Pier (Photos)
5. Carolina
6. Greene
7. Harmony
8. Quonochontaug
9. Ashaway (Photos)
10. Harrisville (Photos)

If you live in one of these small towns like Watch Hill, chances are, you’re not surprised. After all, you know how great you have it.

But for the rest of you–keep reading and we’ll get to just why these small towns made our list.

For more reading on the Ocean State check out:

• 10 Best Places To Live In Rhode Island
• 10 Cheapest Places To Live In Rhode Island
• 10 Most Dangerous Cities In Rhode Island

How We Determined The Coolest Towns In Rhode Island

We threw a lot of criteria at this one in order to get the best, most complete results possible. Using the most recent data from the Census’s 2012-2016 American Community Survey and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, this is the criteria we used:

• Population Density (Higher is better)
• Lowest Unemployment Rates
• Housing costs (Higher is better. More demand.)
• Adjusted Median Income (Higher is better)
• Highly Educated Adults (Higher is better)
• Insurance Rates (Higher is better)
• Commute Times (Lower is better)

We looked at places with populations lower than 5,000 people and greater than 100, of which, there were a lot – 14 to be exact.

We then ranked each place in each category with scores from 1 to 14, averaged them out, and the lowest scores went to our Best Small Towns in Rhode Island. Top of that list — Watch Hill.

Keep reading to find out more about our top 10 best small towns in Rhode Island.

1. Watch Hill

Population: 167
Median Income: $81,765 (6th Best)
Median Home Value: $781,300 (2nd Best)

2. Hope Valley

Population: 1,788
Median Income: $70,474 (7th Best)
Median Home Value: $261,600 (7th Best)

3. Weekapaug

Population: 402
Median Income: $57,955 (12th Best)
Median Home Value: $652,300 (3rd Best)

4. Narragansett Pier

Population: 3,708
Median Income: $62,058 (9th Best)
Median Home Value: $454,000 (5th Best)

5. Carolina

Population: 754
Median Income: $94,333 (2nd Best)
Median Home Value: $278,800 (6th Best)

6. Greene

Population: 728
Median Income: $86,333 (4th Best)
Median Home Value: $254,700 (8th Best)

7. Harmony

Population: 909
Median Income: $100,368 (1st Best)
Median Home Value: $228,200 (10th Best)

8. Quonochontaug

Population: 639
Median Income: $59,688 (10th Best)
Median Home Value: $804,700 (1st Best)

9. Ashaway

Population: 1,111
Median Income: $90,655 (3rd Best)
Median Home Value: $203,500 (12th Best)

10. Harrisville

Population: 1,629
Median Income: $29,464 (14th Best)
Median Home Value: $179,300 (14th Best)

Science Can Tackle Any Issue, Even Small Ones

We said it once and we’ll say it again — this list: it’s just science. We did the research, we crunched the numbers, and it turns out, these 10 small towns in Rhode Island are the best, in which to live.

And who can argue with that?

If you’re curious, here are the worst small towns in Rhode Island:

1. Pascoag
2. Bradford
3. Chepachet

For more Rhode Island reading, check out:

• 10 Best Places To Raise A Family In Rhode Island
• 10 Safest Places In Rhode Island
• 10 Best Cities For Singles In Rhode Island
• 10 Worst Places To Live In Rhode Island

Detailed List Of The Best Small Towns In Rhode Island