I only applied to 2 schools, so my choice is very either/or.
What I'm doing to decide is basically splitting up vet school into 5 aspects and placing them into a hierarchy of importance, then comparing the schools on those aspects. So, in order of importance:
PhD program: I'm going for DVM/PhD, so I need to be sure that the kind of research I want to do is (a) available and (b) high-quality. If equal, I'll pick based on the next category.
Vet school quality: For me, the vet school is just a little less important than the PhD program, only b/c vet education quality tends to be less variable than PhD education. I'm asking things like: are lab groups small, are the facilities new and well-cared for, does the hospital have a high caseload, do they specialize in the type of medicine I'm interested in, is the school highly ranked, etc. If all things are pretty close, then...
Finance: This is a biggie, but if there's a big enough difference in the above categories, I'm willing to pay more. It's basically self explanatory - which school's the better value? If they're about the same, then...
Housing/City: Which city is more fun? How's the bus system? How nice of an apartment can I get within my budget? Finally, I consider...
Touchy-feely: I don't have any friends OOS - should I stay near my friends? I just got engaged - should I stay in-state so I can live with my fiance? Does one school "feel nicer" than another?
You'd think with a system like this, I'd have it easy, right? Wrong! Unfortunately, Minnesota and Michigan are almost the same on most fronts except touchy-feely, and I don't know about the specifics of the most important category, research, at Minn yet. So boo, so much for having a system. Maybe applying it might help you, though.
The reason I ranked things the way that I did, particularly putting the touchy-feely at the bottom, is because I know that emotions and impressions change and can be fickle, and they aren't the best thing to base a decision on. I mean, I wouldn't go to a school I outright hate, but I don't consider transient emotional concerns to be worthy of overriding cold, hard facts about which school is objectively better for my goals.
Can you tell I'm not much of a "follow your heart" guy? 😛