Cost of living, rent, and safety data — Population 430,829 • 0 community reports
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City Score
Strongest: Safety · Room to grow: Healthcare
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Common questions about living in Fort Wayne, IN
Crime rates in Fort Wayne are a touch above the national midpoint. The violent crime index comes in at 104 and property crime at 110, where 100 represents the U.S. average. That's not alarming, but it's enough that you should spend real time researching specific neighborhoods rather than assuming everywhere is equally fine. Talk to people who live there, walk the streets at different hours, and check the local police department's crime map. FBI UCR data.
By most measures, yes. The median rent of $959/month against a median household income of $60,293/year works out to a 19.1% rent-to-income ratio. Financial planners generally want that number under 30%, so Fort Wayne clears the bar with room to spare. You'll have breathing space for savings, car payments, and the occasional splurge. Numbers from Census ACS 2023.
Most people in Fort Wayne are at work within 20 minutes — a pretty reasonable commute by American standards. The breakdown: 78.1% drive alone, 1.2% take public transit, and 8.2% work from home. Rush hour adds time, obviously, but the baseline is manageable.
Everything on this page is built from public government sources: rent and income figures from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS 5-Year Estimates, 2023); commute and transportation data from Census ACS tables B08303 and B08006; crime rates from the FBI Uniform Crime Report. We refresh each dataset monthly through an automated pipeline and cross-check for anomalies. No surveys, no user-submitted guesses — just official federal data presented in a way that's actually useful for people researching a move.
Disclaimer: Data reflects city-wide averages from public sources. Individual neighborhoods, schools, and conditions may differ. Always verify with local agencies before making major decisions.
These calculators pair well with the Fort Wayne, IN dashboard.
City scores blend federal baseline data with community reports from residents. The more reports a city has, the more the score reflects current conditions rather than historical averages.
The overall score is a weighted average of four categories:
Confidence tells you how reliable a score is based on report volume and recency:
CityScore = (BaselineWeight × BaselineScore) + (CrowdWeight × CommunityScore)
CrowdWeight grows from 0% to 50% as reports accumulate. Verified reports count double.
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