Saratoga Tops List Of Most Expensive Cities To Buy A Home

SARATOGA (CBS SF) – A new report finds six of the top 10 most expensive U.S. cities to buy a home are in the Bay Area, with Saratoga topping the list.

The Home Listing Report released Thursday by Coldwell Banker compares the average prices of four-bedroom, two-bathroom homes in more than 2,000 markets across the country.

Saratoga was found to be the most expensive place to buy such a home, with the average price at $2,453,718. That figure beat out Newport Beach in Orange County, which topped the list last year.

"The continued success of the technology industry coupled with the ongoing demand for properties, exclusivity, highly-ranked public schools and comparably larger lot sizes of the area have made Saratoga one of the most desirable places to live in Silicon Valley," Nancy Robinson, regional vice president of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage San Francisco Bay Area, said in a statement.

Five other Bay Area cities rounded out the top 10, including three other cities near Saratoga.

• Cupertino (3^rd most expensive, average list price $1.812 million)
• Redwood City (4^th, $1.807 million)
• San Francisco (7^th, $1.672 million)
• Sunnyvale (9^th, $1.566 million)
• Los Gatos (10^th, $1.47 million)

Palo Alto, which was second on last year's Coldwell Banker list, was not included this year because of the lack of four-bedroom, two-bath homes on the market.

A company spokesperson told CBS San Francisco that a community must have at least 10 such listings on coldwellbanker.com during the first half of the year to be included in the 2016 rankings.

One of the few four-bedroom, two-bath homes for sale in Palo Alto this year was a fixer upper that sold for $4.5 million.

• ALSO READ: Palo Alto Planning Commissioner Quitting Over Pricey Housing Explains Why

Several other Bay Area communities had average four-bedroom, two-bathroom home prices above $1 million. They include San Mateo, Danville, San Rafael, San Jose and Walnut Creek.

For affordability, Detroit topped the company's list. The average price of a home was $64,110 or about 38 times cheaper than Saratoga.

Coldwell Banker found the national average listing price of a four-bedroom, two-bathroom home is $320,120.

Editor's note: A previous version of this story had Concord on the list of Bay Area cities with an average home price above $1 million. Concord, Massachusetts has an average home price above $1 million, while Concord, California has an average of $611,475.

Tim Fang is a digital producer for CBS San Francisco and a native of the Bay Area. Follow him on Twitter @fangtj.

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• Real Estate
• Silicon Valley