Altos is known for tracking list prices, and this looks like a ranking of active listings, not solds – from Forbes.com:
Los Angeles has always been home to some of the world’s most expensive real estate. But forget Beverly Hills, 90210: The new hot spot for multimillion-dollar mansions is Duarte, 91008.
Duarte, Calif., home to the 91008 ZIP code (which also includes the city of Bradbury–a fact that has stirred up a tempest in a teapot), is a small suburb northeast of downtown LA, near the Los Angeles national forest. The median cost of a house in this tony town is a whopping $4,276,462, making it the most expensive housing market in the country. It ranks No. 1 on Forbes’ annual ranking of America’s Most Expensive ZIP Codes.
A scant 1,391 people live in the 91008 ZIP code, and only 12 homes are currently on the market. So a single high-priced listing (like the mammoth nine-bedroom, built this year, that’s selling for $19.8 million) may not adequately represent how everyone in the area lives.
The ascent of Duarte–for which the 91008 ZIP was created since 2000, to accommodate a growing population–shows that wealth is still drawn to big cities, even if their postbubble housing prices have dropped.
“In the big California markets there is essentially a chronic shortage of homes,” says Mike Simonsen, CEO of Altos Research, a Mountain View, Calif., firm that tracks housing market data. “For the number of people that might want homes, there’s always an order of magnitude fewer homes available than there are in Midwest, for example.” More than half the locations in our ranking of America’s 500 most expensive ZIP codes are in California.
The median price of America’s high-end homes continues to slide, but not as fast as it did last year. Our index of 500 high-end ZIP codes saw the average home price fall 5%, to $1.2 million, from the same time last year. In 2009 the markets on our list saw a 7% price drop.
Here is full list of America’s top ten most expensive zip codes for 2010 as reported from Forbes.com:
- Duarte/Bradbury, CA (91008) – Median Home Price: $4,276,462
- Atherton, CA (94027) – Median Home Price: $4,010,200
- Rolling Hills, CA (90274) – Median Home Price: $3,892,456
- Alpine, N.J. (07620) – Median Home Price: $3,814,885
- New York, N.Y. (10014) – Median Home Price: $3,785,445
- Beverly Hills, CA (90210) – Median Home Price: $3,684,150
- New York, N.Y. (10065) – Median Home Price: $3,626,001
- Belvedere/Tiburon, CA (94920) – Median Home Price: $3,283,269
- New York, N.Y. (10012) – Median Home Price: $3,221,371
- Santa Barbara/Montecito, CA (93108) – Median Home Price: $3,151,220
On Craigslist, that would be known as “Beverly Hills Adjacent”
Chuck
I work a stone’s throw away from Bradbury. It’s definitely nice and has occupied that top $ spot before, but priciest doesn’t always mean best.
I read the article linked within the article about the Bradbury vs Duarte thing. I guess locally it could be compared to RSF Covenant vs the tract homes in the east part of Encinitas. Or how La Jolla folks have trouble admitting they are within the city limits of San Diego.
TJ, what is the hgih sale there recently? On redfin it looked like $2.5-something?
Who cares about the ranking of asking prices….
Jim,
I’m the wrong person to ask that question ‘cuz I can only check the same sources as you, but… Zillow shows about $2.9M. They’re only showing about 6 sales in the past year between $1M & $3M; however, there’s a dozen or so places for sale currently with half of them over $5M. Interesting!
The foothills of the mountains right there can provide something rare in the LA area: a view.
Given some of the houses I’ve seen in Pasadena right along the edge where the city meets the mountains, I’d bet there are some very, very desirable lots in the Duarte foothills area. It’s possible that you might even have a distant ocean view there from the upper most lots along the side of the mountains.