According to a new study, the best place in the nation to raise a family is Overland Park, Kansas. However, the second-place finisher is to our north, not too far from Rockford. Sorry Machesney Park, Rockton, Roscoe, and Durand--it's further north than you.

WalletHub, the personal-finance site that routinely crunches numbers on all sorts of Americana, says that the 2nd best place in the USA to raise that family of your is...

Madison, Wisconsin.

Here's what WalletHub looked for to come up with their numbers:

WalletHub’s analysts compared the 150 most populated U.S. cities based on 41 key metrics that take into account essential family dynamics, such as the cost of housing, the quality of local school and health-care systems, and the opportunities for fun and recreation. While obviously not perfect — given the intrinsic value of each city, personal preferences and the limitations of publicly available data — our findings will hopefully give prospective movers a sense of the areas that offer the greatest opportunity to achieve WalletFitness™ and, of course, live a long and happy life.

 

Here are the top 5 best places to raise a family:

1) Overland Park, Kansas

2) Madison, Wisconsin

3) Plano, Texas

4) Seattle Washington

5) Fremont, California

And, the 5 worst places...

146) Hialeah, Florida

147) Shreveport, Louisiana

148) San Bernardino, California

149) Detroit, Michigan

150) Birmingham, Alabama

Illinois' highest ranked place for raising a family is Aurora at #11. Chicago comes in at #31, and then that's it for the Land of Lincoln. Milwaukee makes the list, coming in at #90.

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