The Elite 100: America’s Wealthiest Neighborhoods

The wealthiest 100 neighborhoods in the United States have similar racial make-up as the Higley 1000. There was a slightly higher percentage of Non-Hispanic Whites (91.5%) and significantly fewer Asian-Americans and African-Americans than in the larger list. Hispanics and “Others” were about as well represented in the 57,362 households found in these Elite 100 neighborhoods.

Asian-Americans are still very over-represented in the Elite 100 with 4.3% of the households versus 2.7% of the total households in the United States. Although African-Americans only makeup 1.1% of the Higley 1000 households, they makeup only .7% of the Elite 100. As I have questioned repeatedly on my site, where are the wealthy Black households? They made up 11.7% of all American households in the 2000 Census and 4.4% of the households making over $200,000, yet there representation in the best neighborhoods is negligible.

Hispanic-American’s have about the same percentage (2.2%) of households in the Elite 100 as the Higley 1000. The Cubans that were found in the 3 Miami neighborhoods (Fisher Island, Coco Plum, and Snapper Creek Lakes-Hammock Lakes) represented 30.6% of all Hispanic-Americans found in the Elite 100.

The Elite 100 is surprisingly diverse in terms of the number of metro areas represented on the list. No less than 28 Metro areas have their “best” neighborhoods on the list, although many of them (13) only have one place. As in the list of 1000 neighborhoods, New York City dominates the Elite 100 with 31 neighborhoods or small villages. There are 16 in the state of New York, 8 in Connecticut, and 7 in New Jersey for a total of 31% of the Elite 100. Chicago is a distant second with 11 neighborhoods on the list, while Washington DC has 8 (6 in Maryland and 2 in Virginia). The one oddity is the fact that the San Francisco metro area is so poorly represented in the top 100 (Atherton and Pacific Heights). There are 64 Higley 1000 neighborhoods in San Francisco and the second 100 has no fewer than 6 San Francisco places: Kentfield, Hillsborough, Woodside, Portola Valley, Sanders Ranch, and Diablo.

When defining the type of neighborhood it is best to think of a continuum as some neighborhoods are difficult to assess on a national scale. As an example what is “traditional” or “nouveau riche” in Florida? With some equivocation I have adjudged that Seventy-five of the 100 are what I would call traditional upper class suburbs.

The richest neighborhood in the United States is the lush Holmby Hills neighborhood just west of the Los Angeles Country Club in the so-called Platinum Triangle (along with Beverly Hills and Bel Air). This small neighborhoods has some of the most gargantuan houses in the United States including Candy Spelling’s 60,000 square foot mansion.

The second richest neighborhood in the United States is located in Denver’s lush Cherry Hills Village. I have named this collection of upscale sub-divisions Buell Mansion-Cherry Hills Park after two of this Block Group’s most luxurious developments. Cherry Hills Village is typical of the Western United States in that it is hard to categorize. It is a combination of old wealth and the uber-mansions of the nouveau riche.

The second and third richest neighborhoods in the Higley 1000, North Greenwich-Round Hill, and The Indian Hill Club-Woodley Road area located in Southern Winnetka, are older and very traditional. They exhibit the mature landscaping on carefully screened acreage typical of this type of neighborhood. Each of these neighborhoods have exceptionally large new homes that are interspersed among the equally large older homes.

Twenty-two can be classified as nouveau riche such as Potomac Manor-Potomac Falls Estates outside of DC or the claustrophobic Old Shepard Place in Plano, Texas (possibly the most unpleasant wealthy sub-division in the United States). Twelve of the top 100 are gated communities. Almost all gated communities are by definition nouveau riche, although there are exceptions such as The Highlands outside of Seattle and, Belle Terre, a waterfront gated traditional neighborhood in Greenwich, Connecticut. An excellent example of a nouveau riche neighborhood is Coco Plum-Gables Estates. The Block Group that makes up this “neighborhood” is actually a series of gated communities along Biscayne Bay that also include Old Cutler Bay, Journey’s End, and Hammock Oaks. I don’t really know if “gated” is the term to use for Fisher Island, but I guess it fits if you consider that it is private and not open to the public (you need a boat for access).

There are only four neighborhoods in the Elite 100 that are located in central cities: Midtown Manhattan, Pacific Heights in San Francisco, Washington Park in Seattle, and the Westernmost part of Chestnut Hill in Philadelphia.

As I have made clear in my methodology section, mean income as collected by the Census Bureau has many flaws (realistically a household can’t claim more the $2 million in income), however, I doubt that any observer would question the end result of my research as the communities that represent their metro area are widely acclaimed as the pinnacle of residential success. River Oaks in Houston, Cherry Hills Village in Denver, and Tuxedo Park (a section of Buckhead in Atlanta) are good examples of the best places to live in there respective metro areas.

Here’s is the entire Elite 100 list and their racial make-up. If you are interested in a particular Metro area click on “Neighborhood Summary by Metro Area” on the right side of the this page.

The Higley Elite 100