What are a couple of the nicest/most desirable/most expensive areas where you live?
I’m in Montgomery, Alabama. The most expensive areas include
Wynlakes- a new-ish development (90s-2000s) where you’ll find the areas only million dollar new homes. There’s a lot of criticism for its blandness, but it’s still the current subdivision that says “rich” if you live there.
Cloverdale- a century old community where the properties range from run-down rental properties to beautifully restored Queen Anne/Italian Revival/Spanish Colonial mansions. The Alabama Governor’s Mansion is in this area, with very rundown buildings on the same street.
Westmount. Especially Upper Westmount. It’s the bastion of the unbelievably wealthy – industrial titans, former prime ministers, and so forth – largely Anglophone, although that’s shifted in recent years. It has an, um, interesting political relationship with the rest of Quebec.
The Francophone counterpart to the Anglophone Westmount is Outremont, on the other side of the mountain. Same idea. Outremont is now a borough of the city of Montreal; Westmount was for a while, then de-merged in 2006. Both include more modest but quite prosperous areas (middle to upper-middle class) further down the hill.
Apparently the Beverly Hills of Los Angeles is… not Beverly Hills. Aaron Spelling’s widow has put his estate in Holmby Hills up for $150 million, the most expensive house on the market in the U.S.
(Holmby Hills is part of the “platinum triangle” of Bel Air, Beverly Hills, and itself)
It took me a moment to recover from the shock of thinking that Buffalo, NY has a Beverly Hills, but it got me curious enough to ponder it and even check out some real estate prices to see if my gut reaction played out in the market (it did).
Outside of the city limits, we have East Amherst, a suburban area of large, pricey homes that is known as an affluent area and is now blending into the next township over, Clarence. Different town, the exact same developers kept rolling on. This is all new construction and has a reputation for being a little McMansiony, with bland architecture. Fraught with construction defects, really. But on the plus side, good schools, convenient shopping. The whole thing is très nouveau.
In the city, the nicest area is still the Delaware District and Parkside, built around Delaware Park, an Olmstead jewel. Grand old houses with woodwork to die for. On the downside, while many of the houses are showpieces, the neighborhood is up and down and you could easily find yourself with a neighbor who is letting his house fall down around him. Public schools are eh, the assumption is you would be sending your kids to private school anyway. The last stand of Buffalo’s patriciate, they’re still clinging to it.
I wonder out of curiosity if a realtor for a property like that takes the same percentage as if it were a mortal $100-200K home. Even 4% of that and assuming they get millions less than list price would be $5 million- though of course it would be worth that for somebody who could land that kind of buyer. (While $150,000,000 houses aren’t sold everyday, I’m sure this size of commercial realty and much higher occurs regularly frequently; it’d be interesting to find out.)
My sister lives in Gulf Shores, AL, where the rich area is “anything on the beach”, though of course there’s considerable variance. My sister owns a small 2 BR house on the water that’s up in the 6 figures (off the beach it would be $75K in most cities, but the lot is worth much more than the house of course) but within site of her is what’s called “Castle Aigula” because it’s rumored that the builder was with AIG (no idea if it’s true or not). It’s a French castlestyle palace with about an acre of beachfront that was not quite finished when its gazillionaire builder went bankrupt (hence the A.I.G. rumors) and it’s now owned by his creditors. It’s encircled with a hurricane fence and has 24/7 security guards, still not finished inside (the banks completed the exterior and the roof) and its available for private showings only, but my brother-in-law is one of those people who could talk his way onto Air Force One so he managed to get to see it even though eh and my sister are nowhere near that income range. He said that it’s lots of sheetrock (as mentioned it’s unfinished) but has an enormous greatroom [2 full stories then vaulted ceiling] with an elaborate Biltmore like fireplace, state of the art restaurant sized kitchen, about 7 or 8 bedrooms, every conceivable luxury in the finished bathrooms, a billiard room, a library, etc…
It’s listed for around $20 million (which includes finishing in the style of the buyer’s choosing) though they’d take a lot less; they actually attempted to auction it but it required a minimum starting bid of $7.5 million (and of course letters of credit) and nobody was willing to make a bid, so currently it’s just there empty while bankers are probably praying for a hurricane to destroy it so they can collect insurance (fire would be too suspicious, a hurrican is pretty unfakeable).
A similar OMG mansion was turned into a corporate retreat but currently the area’s overbuilt and companies obviously aren’t buying retreats of that nature. (Jeff Cook of the group Alabama built a sprawling mansionnear his home of Fort Payne which when he attempted to sell of course brought no buyers [who’s gonna pay $7 million for a mansion in Ft. Payne, AL?] so he’s turned it into a retreat and done relatively well.)
I’m in Athens, so that would be Five Pointsarea (where I live). The neighborhood has everything from rental houses (like my place and most houses in my street), to middle of the century houses to mansion-like places (even in my own street).
I don’t know much of the town to know other areas, although I know, from having visited one of my bosses’ house, that such areas exist. Mostly outside the loop.
Although, in general, I don’t like Athens much… I have to admit I love my neighborhood.
The most exclusive little town is probably Belleair Shore or Belleair Beach. Homes in that section run 7 figures for relatively small properties. Most are Gulf front and some are spectacular in architectural terms. Hulk Hogan’s home in this area is for sale for only $25,000,000.
Or maybe it’s Avila, which is more a neighborhood than a town. Here are some representative homes:
$14,000,000 - 8 Bed, 8.5 Bath | 15,547 Sq Ft on 10 Acres
$18,000,000 - 11 Bed, 15 Bath | 28,360 Sq Ft on 3.5 Acres
$25,000,000 - 10 Bed, 11.5 Bath | 28,893 Sq Ft on 5.9 Acres
The Beverly Hills around these parts is…Beverly Hills.
If I had my absolute choice, though, it’s not where I would most like to live. I would rather be in Santa Monica, and if money were no object, somewhere north of Wilshire or even Montana.
In the Columbus, Ohio area the ritziest suburb is probably New Albany with Dublin a close second.
New Albany has a lot of expensive homes and high-income residents. City officials just announced that Aetna will be bringing in 245 new call-center jobs. I don’t know if any of those people will be able to afford living in New Albany unless they build a special ghetto for them.
In Melbourne, Australia it would be Toorak. Housing prices in Melbourne are high enough that only the least affluent suburbs don’t have million dollar houses, but I’d be surprised if a million could buy you an entry level house in Toorak (actually I don’t even know if Toorak even has entry level houses). The best houses in the best parts of Toorak very rarely come to market, and usually make the news when they do.
Buckhead and West Paces Ferry here in the Atlanta area. Multi-million dollar homes near the Governor’s mansion - somewhere I aspire to live someday, but certainly never will.
KarlGrenze, I wanted so badly to live in Five Points when I went to UGA. Instead, I lived in the slum apartments on Baxter.
In Pittsburgh, it would be Fox Chapel, home to the best high school in this part of the state, Theresa Heinz Kerry’s local residence and Bill Cowher, ex-coach of the Steelers.
