America’s ZIP Codes with the Most Expensive Houses? We’ve Got Nine of the Top 25
The list of the nation’s most expensive ZIP codes for housing can be taken as a guide to where the wealthy hang out or where — like the yacht market — if you have to ask the price, you can’t afford it.
Or you can take it as where Californians live, because in this year’s list, compiled by the real estate website PropertyShark.com, 17 of the 25 most expensive ZIP codes are in California and nine of those are in the Bay Area.
Let’s face it, anytime the 95070 ZIP code (Saratoga) is at the bottom of an expensive list, it’s a very expensive list.
The list is based on the median sales price of properties sold in 2015, and there must have been at least five properties sold in that ZIP code to qualify. So there could be pricier places out there where gentry live in homes handed down since colonial times and those folks simply aren’t doing deals.
But in the workaday world of tech billionaires and early employees of unicorn companies that we’re familiar with — the people who need that sixth bedroom or 50 yards or so of two-lane driveway — a median sales price of $2.2 million in Saratoga is where this list begins.
It tops out at $8.5 million in the 11962 ZIP code, which is Sagaponack, New York: a village on the eastern tip of Long Island that is, or has been, home for people like Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein; late night TV host Jimmy Fallon; authors Truman Capote, George Plimpton, Kurt Vonnegut and E.L. Doctorow; actor Roy Scheider; musician Billy Joel; and former President Bill Clinton and current presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
After that, 94027 (Atherton, $5.9 million), 90210 (Beverly Hills, but you knew that one, $3.5 million) and 94301 (Palo Alto, $3.2 million) sandwich 10013 in New York City ($3.4 million) to fill out the most expensive five.
The other Bay Area ZIP codes on the list are all on the Peninsula, including:
12. 94022 — Los Altos, $2.8 million
14. 94024 — Los Altos, $2.6 million
15. 94028 — Portola Valley, $2.6 million
16. 94123 — San Francisco, $2.5 million
22. 94306 — Palo Alto, $2.3 million
24. 94010 — Burlingame, $2.2 million
If you plot these ZIP codes against the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s annual list(subscribers only) of the 25 wealthiest ZIP codes in our coverage area published Dec. 4, 2015, you’ll see that the wealthiest families don’t necessarily live in the most expensive homes (or at least they weren’t selling last year).
Here are the nine Bay Area ZIP codes on PropertyShark’s list in descending order of expensive homes and the average net worth of families (and the rank on our list):
94027 — Atherton, $3.24 million (1)
94301 — Palo Alto, $1.59 million (11)
94022 — Los Altos, $2.76 million (4)
94024 — Los Altos, $2.8 million (3)
94028 — Portola Valley, $3.03 million (2)
94123 — San Francisco (not in coverage area)
94306 — Palo Alto (not among top 25 wealthiest)
94010 — Burlingame (not in coverage area)
95070 — Saratoga, $2.78 million (5)
PropertyShark’s full list is here.
