Charlottesville used to be #1

… in 1998. Thanks to Money Magazine for the recap (no longer available).

Since then the city’s population has held fairly steady, although the greater Charlottesville area has seen a boom in residents. MONEY’s was one of the first of a host of best-place listings, followed coincidentally or not — by a near tripling of housing prices in less than a decade. These days a four-bedroom home easily costs $400,000, and that’s before you update the kitchen. In response, city officials have lowered property taxes.

By the way, the City (nor the County of Albemarle) hasn’t “lowered taxes.” They’ve lowered the mil rate, in light of assessments that had risen 10-20% year over year. Saying they’ve “lowered property taxes” is not even remotely accurate.

Oh, and we’re also apparently a suburb of DC (archived: 2020). (thanks to and eagle-eyed reader for the tip)

That 85% of the region have a commute under 30 minutes is relatively good. (relative that is, to the folks relocating from Northern Virginia, California, Massachussetts,etc)