Money's list of America's best small cities


Affordable homes
Residents who buy real estate in these cities from the Best Places database see their incomes go the furthest.
Rank City Median home sale price 2009
1 Deerfield Beach, FL $67,000
2 Lafayette, IN $82,210
3 San Antonio, TX $78,627
4 Deltona, FL $80,473
5 Spring, TX $112,062
6 Glendale, AZ $105,000
7 Avondale, AZ $111,100
8 Bolingbrook, IL $155,000
9 Fishers, IN $174,296
10 Des Moines, IA $100,000
11 Cedar Rapids, IA $120,500
12 Spring Valley, NV $135,000
13 Warner Robins, GA $110,000
14 Wichita, KS $115,138
15 Dale City, VA $163,000
16 Lincoln, NE $125,000
17 Overland Park, KS $200,000
18 Joliet, IL $152,000
19 Huntsville, AL $140,000
20 Murfreesboro, TN $141,000
21 O'Fallon, MO $172,250
22 Rogers, AR $124,483
23 Fargo, ND $144,802
24 Springdale, AR $115,951
25 Washington, NJ $204,450
From the August 2010 issue
Source: Onboard Informatics, actual sales collected from county and municipal assessors' offices. Only includes sales within city boundaries. Only cities where there were more than 100 home sales in 2009, and that were experiencing job and population growth, were considered. No more than 2 places within a state, and no more than 1 place within a county could qualify.
Best Places Winners
MAPS
Home price trends
Hover over any of the 10 Best Places below to see how real estate prices have changed in the past 2 years.
City Avg. listing price
(June 2010)
1. Eden Prairie, MN $430,710
2. Columbia-Ellicott
     City, MD
$487,602
3. Newton, MA $989,445
4. Bellevue, WA $801,423
5. McKinney, TX $267,661
6. Fort Collins, CO $271,950
7. Overland Park, KS $308,235
8. Fishers, IN $282,482
9. Ames, IA $189,657
10. Rogers, AR $269,229

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Find Your Best Places
Region
Northeast South
Midwest West
Ranking
Top 100 winners only
Population
8.4M
46,000
Home Prices
2009 median sales prices
$1.2M
$36K
Video
Using statistics from data provider Onboard Informatics, we crunched the numbers in order to zero in on America's best small cities for families. (Last year, we looked at small towns, with populations between 8,500 and 50,000.) More

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