Money's list of America's best small cities


Top 100
Rank City Population
1 Carmel, IN 80,100
2 McKinney, TX 136,100
3 Eden Prairie, MN 61,200
4 Newton, MA 84,700
5 Redmond, WA 55,200
6 Irvine, CA 213,600
7 Reston, VA 60,300
8 Columbia/Ellicott City, MD 100,700
9 Overland Park, KS 175,300
10 Chapel Hill, NC 59,000
11 Woodbury, MN 63,600
12 Fishers, IN 78,600
13 Allen, TX 83,700
14 Eagan, MN 64,700
15 Centreville, VA 72,900
16 Parsippany-Troy Hills, NJ 53,200
17 Castle Rock, CO 52,500
18 South Jordan, UT 52,700
19 Lakeville, MN 56,700
20 Waldorf, MD 69,400
21 Highlands Ranch, CO 95,900
22 Maple Grove, MN 61,800
23 Gaithersburg, MD 63,400
24 Germantown, MD 88,000
25 Troy, MI 80,300
From the September 2012 issue
Due to erroneous job, cost-of-living, and test score data for a small number of places, two cities were left off this year's top 100 and two were mistakenly included. Other cities moved up or down slightly once all data were corrected. Details.
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 year.
City Avg. listing price
(July 2012)
1. Carmel, IN $304,340
2. McKinney, TX $245,917
3. Eden Prairie, MN $413,566
4. Newton, MA $850,117
5. Redmond, WA $518,982
6. Irvine, CA $904,753
7. Reston, VA $467,934
8. Columbia/Ellicott City, MD $406,943
9. Overland Park, KS $278,204
10. Chapel Hill, NC $376,660

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Video
Using statistics from data services company 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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