Money's list of America's best small cities


States
Top 100
Rank City Population
60 Boulder 97,700
17 Castle Rock 52,500
47 Centennial 107,900
70 Fort Collins 147,000
21 Highlands Ranch 95,900
Other cities
  Arvada 107,361
  Aurora 321,562
  Colorado Springs 421,350
  Denver 598,707
  Grand Junction 60,103
  Greeley 98,108
  Lakewood 144,703
  Longmont 86,083
  Loveland 67,447
  Pueblo 107,670
  Thornton 115,673
  Westminster 107,416
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
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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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