Chilmark Wins! Poor People Lose

In case you didn't already know, Chilmark is the most expensive small town in the country. What does that mean? It means that you pay a lot of money for a house in a town with no amenities or people (as opposed to all the places out there where those things are not selling points). This sweet title is courtesy of Business Week. They looked for the most expensive place to buy a home in the town with the fewest people.

Chilmark assesor Pamela Bunker told BW that, "People are asking for high prices because people don't have to sell." She also thinks it is the water views and 3-acre zoning. More from BW:

Residents of America's most expensive small town get by without a chain store or even a traffic light. The town has one gas station, an elementary school, a community center, a general store, dairy and vegetable farms, and some restaurants and inns that open during the warm seasons.

Median home value is $2.237 million in Chilmark, a small town on Martha's Vineyard, an island south of Cape Cod. The town is home to 953 year-round residents, but the population swells dramatically during the summer when the rich and famous—including Seinfeld creator Larry David and actor Ted Danson—settle in for the summer. Chilmark, which includes the 300-year-old fishing village of Menemsha, has only 1,700 homes, many of them expensive vacation properties, and is the second-least densely populated town on the island. Houses rarely go on sale here, but when they do prices are high. On Sept. 12 a buyer paid $13.8 million for eight acres with a nine-bedroom home on it. In July, another buyer paid $15 million for 27 acres of land near the town's beautiful Squibnocket Beach.

"I definitely think inventory has a lot to do with it," Pamela Bunker, Chilmark's assistant assessor, said of the home values. "People are asking for high, high prices because people don't have to sell. We have amazing water views here. And the three-acre zoning keeps it really rural." ...(more)