The San Francisco Bay Area town of Atherton was ranked as the most expensive ZIP code for housing in the United States this past March, according to data compiled by The Business Journals.
The Silicon Valley suburb, located in San Mateo County, California, just south of San Francisco, had a median home value of more than $7.7 million, the highest by more than $2 million and a 4.16 percent increase over November 2023.
Atherton has a population of 6,707, covers roughly 5 square miles, and has a demographic of 72 percent white and 20 percent Asian, according to data by World Population Review. Additionally, it boasts an average household income of nearly $600,000.
The town has been home to many billionaires and celebrities, such as the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, former HP CEO Meg Whitman, former Google chairman Eric Schmidt, and the Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry.
It is also in a prime location for Big Tech, less than an hour’s drive from San Francisco and 30 minutes from the headquarters of Google, Meta, and the Tesla factory.
Atherton is almost entirely residential. Its website indicates that it has no commercial zoning, meaning it is without restaurants or stores.
Moreover, Atherton is zoned almost entirely for single-family homes and has a minimum lot size requirement of one acre.
Because of the lack of multi-family housing in its plans, the town has been struggling to receive certification from the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) for its 2023–2031 Housing Element Update, its website states.
Atherton is required to plan for 348 new housing units as part of the state’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation program for 2023–2031, which would likely drive the town’s median home price down.
Its original plans were rejected last year by HCD due to an overreliance on Accessory Dwelling Units, which made up 280 of the 434 new units it planned.
The state determined that Atherton’s proposals violated the state-mandated objective of Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing, particularly in terms of providing equitable access to housing for all residents.
To address these concerns, Atherton has revised its housing element to include more sites for potential multifamily housing and is currently undergoing an analysis to assess the environmental impacts of these proposed developments.
While Atherton is the leader in high home prices in the nation, California as a whole is known for expensive housing, especially in the Bay Area.
California real estate is the most expensive of any state, with a median price of $787,000, according to Redfin housing data, which also reports San Mateo County—where Atherton sits—as having a median home sale price exceeding $1.7 million.
Data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey rank San Mateo County as the fourth richest county in the United States, with a median household income of around $150,000; and second richest in California, ranking only behind Santa Clara County, which has a median income of over $153,000.
The greater Bay Area as a whole is not much cheaper.
The 2024 Demographia International Housing Affordability report by Chapman University looked at 94 major housing markets across eight countries and ranked the San Francisco metro as the eighth most unaffordable region and San Jose as the fourth most unaffordable.
