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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: MONEY's Best Places to Live Launch [Watch (HLS stream): MONEY's Best Places to Live Launch](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/39tOqwJM.m3u8) (36:08)  _Published 2016-09-19. MONEY reveals 2016's Best Places to Live on Facebook._ --- Jul 27, 2023 8:48 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [Money's #5 Best Place to Live 2017](/video/RZMqCCuP/) ### Money's #5 Best Place to Live 2017 [Money's #2 Best Place to Live 2017](/video/5ayzhYgH/) ### Money's #2 Best Place to Live 2017 [MONEY's Best Places to Retire](/video/CT0oNUGL/) ### MONEY's Best Places to Retire --- ## Transcript Good morning, Facebook friends. Today the big day of Money magazine. We are revealing the 2016 best places to live in the United States. Our staff has been working for months to compile this list, and we bring it to you live, I'm Mark Pfizer. And I'm Taylor Tepper. We'll be counting down the top ten this morning. Throughout the next half hour, we'll give you clues as we get closer to the number one town. All right, Taylor, you ready for the first clue? I am absolutely ready. This year's winner comes from a state that has never had a number one town before. Hm. Leave your guesses for the number one town in the comment section. If you have questions about the list, ask away. We wanna hear from you guys. This year we looked at towns and cities with populations between fifty thousand, and three hundred thousand. We analyzed sixty data points including home prices, crime rate, job market, racial diversity. Anything that you could want in a home town, we looked at it. My friend and staffer, Kerry Close, is over here. She crunched all the numbers with me which means she's got spreadsheets that last as long as the day is long, and she's here to answer any questions that you guys might have about a place that's interesting to you. So let's get to it. Taylor, do you wanna start to reveal some of the top ten? I would absolutely love to, nothing would give me more pleasure in the world. Good. Here we go. Number ten is Naperville, Illinois. So Mark what is Naperville, Illinois really known for? So Naperville is a suburb of Chicago but it's got a beautiful river that runs through it, the Dupage which has been renovated over the years and now is a beautiful public walking area with public art. So it's a place that people can live affordably in the Chicago area but have a lovely town to come home to at night. Is there a lot of commuting? Like how, what sort of, how does that work? The commute it's a decent kind size of commute. It's not five minutes because you know Chicago is a big city. Yeah. But it's commutable, which is nice. Okay, so congratulations, Naperville. Number nine is Beaverton, Oregon. Beaverton is a suburb of Portland, is that correct? Or it's right outside? Correct. So tell me more about it. Tell America what Beaverton's all about. Well America already knows Beaverton's biggest export, which is Nike. Like his home town is in Beaverton. But it's also a hugely diverse city, there are more than 100 foreign languages spoken in the public schools. Wow. Schools are excellent, and there's no sales tax in Portland, in Oregon. Yeah. So that makes it a cheaper place to live even than Washington And, how do people [ UNKNOWN ] commute to Portland from Beaverton? Is there a nice community in there, or nice economy in there? Yes, but like all the towns on our list, these are places where, frankly, there's a ; pt of industry and job opportunity in town. Assumably, you could commute from Portland. Right. Or, to Portland, but- Or do a reverse commute. Or do reverse commute. Or, never leave home, and stay in beautiful Beaverton, Oregon. Yeah. So [ UNKNOWN ] places is our biggest story of the year Taylor, I want to sort of check to see how well you have been paying attention to best places over the year, so I'm gonna start with a little best places quiz. Okay, I think I'm ready. I know it's early. I can do it. Okay, MONEY named its first Best Place to Live In 1987. Mhmm. Which town won? Was it Nashua, New Hampshire, Nashville, Tennessee, Asheville, North Carolina, or Ashtabula, Ohio? Well it certainly has a Ash in the name. Yes. And I only know that three of those towns are actual real towns. They're all real towns. I don't know about Ashtabula. I think you made that up. No. The people of Ashtabula are not gonna be very happy with you. They can leave comments on our Facebook page. I'm gonna go with Nashua. Nashua, New Hampshire is correct. Actually, it won twice. I think it may be the only place that won twice. But it was our very first best place to live. You win continuing with our broadcast. All right. Number two, which of these factors do we not, I said not consider, when we're collecting on the best place to live. Okay. Was it A, campsites nearby. B, the obesity rate. C, the number of divorced people in town or D, how well public school kids do on reading. I'm gonna go with campsites cuz camping is not my favorite thing to do. Yeah, well that's not relevant. [ LAUGH ] Cuz some people like to camp. The actual answer is C, that number of divorced people. Wow. But I will tell you. Yes. We collect So much data that we actually know how many divorce people there are in each of these 823 communities. Are you put it out on your mind? We just don't put it in our computation. Absolutely! Third, Mm- hm Next question. Which state is home to the healthiest place to live in America? Right. A. Utah, B. Colorado C, Maine, D, Hawaii. I'm going to go with Hawaii, cuz you're outdoors the entire time. You can go in the ocean. Right. And you have all kinds of fun. Sounds lovely. Right. That's not correct actually. Colorado is home to the best, most healthiest place to live on our list. That's true. They do love talking about how much they are outdoors there. So there you go. Last question. Yes. A little bit of a dicey question. [ laughter ] You'll see why in a second. Yes. In 1987 our first year, we also named the worst place to live in America. Yes. We only did it once because, I think we realized it wasn't suck a great thing to do. No it wasn't a good idea. Let's see if you know what it might be. Okay. Was it Detroit. Newark, Compton, California, or Flint, Michigan. Worst place, did it once never did it again. I'm going to go with some place close by that I've driven through. Is it Is it Newark? It is not, it was not Newark. Okay. It was actually Flint, Michigan which has its own issues now. Yes. So 30 years ago Flint was a place that was challenged and Still remains. Here we are. Yeah. Yeah and it's been going through a lot of trouble. So here's the interesting thing about Flint, Michigan Yeah. at that time. At the time Roger and Me which was this movie by? I know. Who? Moore. Micheal Moore, not Roger Moore. Yeah. But he could of done it. He put a scene in his movie about [ UNKNOWN ] naming Flint the worst place to live. Was he pro or con? He was not happy. [ LAUGH ] So that will teach us to be naming worst places to live. I think unhappiness is his generations Yes. Exactly. Alright. Your turn. If your just joining us, we're counting down money's 2016 best place to live. Leave your questions and comments below. We want to hear from you guys. Time to reel some more best places. Time to find out where number eight and number seven came from. Mark, if you would please. Let's start with number eight. It is Western Florida. Well done. You chimed in there because you've actually been to Western Florida. I was very excited, I just went to western Florida a few months ago It is a lovely town, it is right next to the Everglades. There are a lot of good opportunities. Like there's a big health center, there's a Cleveland clinic there, there's a huge employer there that does a lot of IT and HR. It's a beautiful town. Everything is very manicured. It's a planned community, right? Planned community. Right. Tons of parks, baseball diamonds, kids playing everywhere, people running and jogging. It's also very healthy. Sounds great. If it weren't so hot all the time, maybe it would be the most healthy. Yeah. But people can't render in the light. All right, let's move on. Number 7 is- Do you want me to do it? You do it. Clarkstown, New York, tell me about Clarkstown. So Clarkstown is a suburb of New York City, 35 miles away on the Hudson River. Yeah. Actually, it's an accumulation of several small villages. Hamlets. Hamlets, you might say, west Niac. So it's a place that is relatively affordable for the New York City area, and it's one of the reasons that people want to live there, and why it's one of our best places. Edward Hopper grew up there, so it's famous for that. The Tapaneze Bridge runs nearby So it's a place that you can afford to live on the river, on the Hudson, in the New York City area and still have change in your pocket after the week is over. What is your favorite thing about Clarkstown? Here's a little- known fact. Rosie O'Donnell used to live in [ UNKNOWN ] and I once did a story on Rosie O'Donnell and visited her in her house. Wow. So that's [ CROSSTALK ] Was it a pretty house? It was a beautiful, beautiful house. [ LAUGH ] She moved to New Jersey however. Of course. So there you go, little known fact. No one ever stays for very long. If you're just joining us, we want to hear from you guys, have questions or comments, please write us to below so you can tell us what's going on. I guess I'm supposed to tutor on [ INAUDIBLE ] a little bit here and talk about how much work it takes to put together best places to live, and it does take a lot of work. We work on it for several months, compiling data upon data, data I didn't even know existed on places. We start with 823 communities this year because we work from towns that are 50, 000, population up to 300, 000. That's a wide range. It is a wide range, but we want to be able to get different kinds of places each year and then we start to narrow things down after we collect all this data. Because this is Money Magazine. [ LAUGH ] It was important for us to look a place where they really good jobs, where the median home price was affordable, where taxes were low. So a lot of those pocket books issues are very much apart of what we do in our top notations. But we also look at lifestyle things, we look at how healthy the population is The weather. Believe it or not, people wanna live a place where the weather is nice. Yeah. Access to health care. So it's sort of a combination of financial factors and [ UNKNOWN ] factors. And the other thing that we do that we do that nobody else really does is looking for a diverse community. We rule out places that do not have a good kind of racial and ethnic and cultural diversity because we want to pick places where anybody would feel comfortable living. Absolutely, and we don't look at divorce rates. Right, no divorce. Any questions from the audience? We're getting one written down right now. [ BLANK_AUDIO ] It's very, very, very. Aha, okay. Okay, okay, here it comes. It's coming in. [ BLANK_AUDIO ] So, can you comment, can you comment. Can I? It depends. On the median home cost and the tax rates of the places that we picked? I cannot comment. [ LAUGH ] I think that is a good, so can you comment on that? I could comment on that, yeah. So, obviously, the biggest investment people make in their lives is the cost of their homes. So, it's a major factor in what we compute to see how a place will rank on our list. We don't rule places out because the home prices are the most expensive in the country, or the least expensive. We're looking for places where you can get good value. So, places where the quality of life intersects with affordability are very important, and taxes are obviously a part of that. We try to find places where there are good services, good education, good healthcare. But the amount of money people pay in property taxes is low relative to the amount of money that their houses costs. So, there are places like Parsippany, New Jersey. Right. Which is an expensive place to live but the taxes are relatively low there for other places in New Jersey. Yes. So that's the kind of thing that goes with our show. How's that guys? Anymore comments? Nope. Good. Alright, keep going, time for another clue, that means my turn for you. How wonderful. Remember our first clue was this years winner comes from a state that's never had a winner before. Going through the database. Second clue was the indie rock band Animal Collective made an album after an iconic landmark in our 2016 best place. Okay so I will register that and I'll think about it. Good. Well it's getting a little closer now to that number one, as we reveal number six and number five. So number six is Highlands Ranch, Colorado. Highlands Ranch, Colorado. Is it a very healthy place? Super nice place. You know this because Highlands Ranch was actually in one of our secondary lists. And we determined it to be the healthiest place to live in America. So what factors into that? So, how the disease rates, how healthy people say they are. How close people, how close hospitals and doctors are. How many hospitals there are within 30 miles. So any kind of element of healthcare that you That a resident would think is important- Right. Is something that we can include. And Highlands Ranch has this in stock. Highlands Ranch has it in major stock. [ LAUGH ] But it's also an affordable place to live. It's a commutable place to live. People in Highlands Ranch call their town the bubble because they feel like it's kind of this paradise that's protected from the craziness of the outside world. The schools are great. [ LAUGH ] So, that's how it was ripped. Wonderful. And so, let's go to number five, Parsippany, New Jersey. Parsippany? I already gave away the Parsippany. You just mentioned it. I realized that before, but it's worth it. Parsippany is nice enough that it's worth talking about, too. Why is it better than all the other towns in New Jersey? It's true, it is the best place to live in New Jersey. Right. Because it's a beautiful place. People think of New Jersey as being just off turnpike exit x. It's not. Parsippany is, well even if it were, you gotta ride on the turnpike to get places. But it's a lovely suburb. Lots of outdoors. Parsippany Lake is a Beloved place in Parsippany, but like I was saying before about taxes, the property taxes there are among the lowest of any place in New Jersey that was on our list, so it's affordable. You can commute to Washington. To Washington, where did that come from? [ LAUGH ] You can commute to New York. Suppose you could about how dedicated you are. Yeah, that's true. So it's an affordable place to live. Good jobs. And people up there. Yeah. They can't complain. So, Money also picked the best cities this year. Best big cities. We did it by region of the country . >> So, Mark, what is the best [ LAUGH ] Okay. So what's the best big city in North Carolina? The best big city in North Carolina, which is also the best big city in the whole southeast is Raleigh, North Carolina. What's so special about Raleigh? Raleigh is in the research triangle of North Carolina, so it's at the benefits of being close to major universities. Is Duke University, North Carolina. Also a hub for banking, lots of jobs- Available in North Carolina. The medium home price is affordable, much less than it is in the United States on average. The weather is great. [ LAUGH ] North Carolina's become a major place for retirees to live because it's very livable. Yeah, and it's warm. And it's warm. Cool. So let's move a little bit to where it's not so warm in the winter. Talk to me about Boston, Massachusetts. Boston, Massachusetts. The best city to live in in the Northeast. Boston is known for culture. They spend more money per capita on cultural activities and investment in Boston than any place in the country Obviously, a huge university mecca. Increasingly a tech mecca. Yeah. Companies who were in other tech- centric places are moving to Boston. It's just sort of got something for everyone. Especially the winters since [ UNKNOWN ] cold weather. It's also the home of [ UNKNOWN ] editor here at Money. There you go. Author of three books on investing. Yes. Okay, so let's move to the Midwest. Okay. What is the best town over there? Best town? We're talking best cities. Best cities, excuse me. Yeah. I forgot. Columbus, Ohio. Right. Good Bye Columbus, Phillip Roth book. Yeah. Columbus, Ohio is the best place to live in the Midwest. Also a university town. Affordable homes. People love Columbus. And, you know? I think when people think about best cities. Or when they think about cities, they think about New York and LA. There are cities that are smaller and can be very livable. And Columbus has that in spades. I think that people just really love the sort of smaller feel of Columbus, Ohio. But still like. Fun things to do, it's not that... Right! Obviously lots of culture, the university access, jobs that come with being in a big city. But not so crazy like it's New York. Not so crazy, but Columbus... the jobs in Columbus are crazy, apparently the job growth has been higher in Columbus in the last year than even San Fransisco. Wow. So, if you're looking for a job. Go to Columbus. And you might be looking for a job after this. I know, if I'm lucky. So let's go down south. Where's is the best town, the best big city to live down. [ INAUDIBLE ] The best big city in the South is Arlington, Texas. Wow, tell me about Arlington. Also known as the entertainment capital of Texas. Uh- huh. So, I imagine the good people of Austin. Right. Might have something to say about that. A mecca for sports franchises. There are four major sports franchises in Arlington. Then the Rangers. Including the Rangers. You tell me. What do you know about Arlington? Have you been there? I have not. I know that the Rangers play there. Yeah. I note in between Dallas in Fort Worth- Right. And I imagine that it's an affordable place to live, relatively low taxes. Right. The medium home price in the Arlington is less than $ 200, 000 which is not [ UNKNOWN ]. And especially coming from here. Right. Alright so let's go a little bit further West bt not too far west and we'll go to the next big city in The mountain region. The mountain region. The best big city in the mountain region is Colorado Springs, Colorado. Wow. You know anything about Colorado Springs? I think Tesla has something to do with Colorado Springs. Okay. But I'm not entirely sure. Very good. What else? It has the name Colorado in it. Ha, the Olympics, our training facilities are all Colorado Springs, so I think to the degree that people outside of Colorado Springs know about it, they think about sports. Obviously there's great skiing and such, but there's also a wonderful amount of Job opportunities there. Houses are affordable relative to you know the Denver area is growing like crazy. Yeah? But Colorado Springs you can actually afford to buy a house. And Colorado we already know has some of the most healthy places to live in the country. Yeah, it's that mountain air. Yeah And our last one, let's move out west. Yep It's close to a It's another, it's close to another best big, best town that we're going to mention later, << don't give ="" it ="" all ="" away .="" >> I'm not going to. I'm not going to. But, so tell me a little bit about our best big city out west . Portland, Oregon. Not to be confused Portland, Maine. Which did you know that Portland, Maine is the best place to live in Maine? I would imagine! There you go. But Portland, Oregon. The lobstering. Yes. So Portland is an affordable place to live. And part because they have no sales tax. But it's a huge foodie hub. Coffee was the first thing you said when we were talking about it. But housing is affordable in Portland. And you're close to a city, which is obviously an appeal to some people. But also very accessible to the mountains and to outdoors activities. Not as healthy as Colorado but very healthy. Yeah. It's a nice, very beautiful place to live. I have friends who live there, by it, and they love it . >> Do they let you visit ? >> No. I'm not cool enough to go up there . >> Good to know . >> But we have another question from America. America what do you want to know from us? Thank you Veronica . >> Thank you Karel Maryl . >> Thank you. Two questions . >> Two questions, it's a spoil . >> Do you consider job opportunities in your rankings ? >> No. [ LAUGH ] Project job growth, the unemployment rate, the increase since 2010, this is a very informed question. Very specific question. Yes. I wonder who this came from? Yes, in fact we do consider all of these things. We look at the unemployment rate currently, we look at the project job growth over the next five years. We look at how much incomes have increased. So I mean, we're very concerned. It's lovely to say, I'd love to live in the most beautiful place in America. But if you can't afford to buy a house. Or they're no job opportunities. And then no jobs, it's not a very fun place to live after all. So, those financial factors are key to our determining which of the 822 slides that we picked. [ LAUGH ] List number 2. No, I have another question. That's what I'm asking. What's the second question? I thought you meant what's number two on the list. Calm down we'll get there. Why do you rank the small cities but not the big cities? Well we do rate the big cities, we're going through them right now. But we don't rank the big cities overall. I see. We pick the best big city by region. Why don't we compare New York to Beaverton? Why don't we compare New York to Beavertown. Well, I think it's more of why we dont's compare New York to Portland. Okay. And because, cities are so unique that it seems not a fair fight in some ways. There are certainly things about New York that would make it a wonderful place to live. But, we want to give people choices. Not everybody wants to live. To live or move across the country. [ LAUGH ] To the one big city. So we start to give a lot of entry points. Ways for people to find places if they are looking for a new hometown. Whether it's a city or a smaller town that you can get to without uprooting your whole life 3, 000 miles. Yeah, okay. Well, thank you very much for the questions. Keep them coming. More, more. I asked and I received. All right, [ CROSSTALK ] this water. You can drink some water. Mark, what about local initiatives around innovations or entrepreneurship. Local Local initiatives. Local initiatives . >> So we certainly look for places that are innovative. You'll see, later on, I'm not gonna give you the name even though I almost did. One of the towns that we picked is really at the forefront of renewable energy. We talk about a part of this town that where all of the homes are outfitted for solar, high insulation and all that kinds of stuff. We obviously, jobs are important. So cities and towns that have found ways to attract innovation and entrepreneurship whether it's by tax breaks or Keeping the young people You don't have to be young to be innovative. Now, come one. It helps. It doesn't help. Old people can be innovative, too. I suppose. But yes, we are looking for places where people feel like they can move in and have a good life and start a new business, perhaps. Yeah? Start over again? Start over? Well I don't know about that. All right, where are we? So more clues. More clues. You ready? I absolutely am ready. Next clue. This is a clue about the best place to live. [ CROSSTALK ]. Okay. You go. So actually the Pulitzer prize winning novelist, Michael Chabon, who's one of my favorite novelists, was actually raised here. Interesting. So keep that in the back of your- [ INAUDIBLE ] Best place. Yeah, keep it back in your mind while you're thinking about it. If you're just joining us on Facebook welcome, we're counting down Money's best place to live in 2016. And we've got four left, so let's just go do it Number four. Number four is West Des Moines, Iowa. This is separate from East Point Iowa or Des Moines Iowa. [ LAUGH ] There's no East Des Moines Iowa. So left and east Des Moines. But West Des Moines Iowa is its own place. In fact such a great place it's the great place to live in Iowa. Wow. It's on the other side of the airport from Capital. People from Iowa. Des Moines is a insurance hotbed. They call it the Hartford of Iowa. West Des Moines is a place where you can live comfortably and get to all of those jobs through commuting. Time on average in West Des Moines is the lowest of any place on our list, 17 minutes. How long is your commute? My commute is about an hour and 13 minutes long. Okay, so if you moved to West Des Moines you'd have an awesome commute. And be happier. The median home price is under $ 200, 000 here. So if you're looking for those kinds of ways to make your life easy and livable and enjoy yourself, West Des Moines is a great choice. Yeah Imagine the winters a little bit cold. Come on. Change of season. So why don't you say number three? Number three is Plano, Texas. You took it away from me. You were taking too long, I couldn't say it. So Plano, Texas. Plano is a large city, at the top end of population wise on our list It's a business hotbed. Huge number of corporations who have presence in Plano, including- I'm gonna say JP Morgan Chase. Okay. I'm gonna say [ UNKNOWN ] is moving there. [ LAUGH ] How about Frito Lay. Frito Lay. Pepsi Co. Wonderful, all big things we've heard of. Right, so Plano is really a place where large businesses have thrived. It's outside of Dallas. But it's really giving Dallas a run for it's money as far as attracting companies. They're very tax friendly, and houses are affordable, and the schools are awesome. Wow. Wonderful. So you can't go wrong. Can't. Okay, so lets go to number two. So we're getting closer to number one, but number two is Eden Prairie, Minnesota. Tell me about Eden Prairie. So Eden Prairie is that place that I mentioned where they have a whole section that has renewable energy. Eden Prairie is almost always on our list of best places. It was the best place to live in 2010. People love Eden Prairie. We go back there all the time because Always does well and inevitable find people who have moved there, in part, because they've read our story and they love it. There's a small hometown feeling but it's a place that's big enough to generate its own jobs. There's actually almost as many jobs in town in Eagle Prairie as there are residents. Wow. So people are commuting to Eden Prairie. That's incredible. To work. Which is pretty awesome. Or the children are working. [ LAUGH ] Yeah. There you go. And finally, we're at number one. So let's review the clues. Clue number one. This year's winner came from a state that had never before had a number one best town to live. Number two, the indie rock band, Animal Collective, named an album after an iconic landmark in our 2016 best place to live. Clue number three Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Michael Shabom was raised here and clue number four talk about girl power, this years winner heads to cities in France, Spain and Ghana. So now lets review the best places so far. Neighborville Illinois, Beaverton Oregon, Weston Florida, Clarkson New York, Thailand Ranch Colorado Parsippany New Jersey, West Des Moines Iowa, Plano Texas, Eden Prairie Minnesota, and, drumroll please, if you can hear that out in Columbia, Maryland? Columbia, Maryland. The best place to live. Congratulations, Columbia, Maryland. So joining us from Skype, if the technology geniuses are doing their job, is Allan Kittleman. He grew up in Columbia and is the Howard county executive. Allan, are you there, can you hear us? We're here, we're very, very excited, thank you so much, but it's something we've known forever that [ LAUGH ] Columbia is the one of the best place to live in the world but now the rest of the country knows it. So where are you stated [ UNKNOWN ] it looks like you're in the ocean or a lake or something there [ LAUGH ] Now we agree men made lakes here in Columbia this is like [ UNKNOWN ], behind me are all the leaders of Columbia who joined us And we're so excited. Y'all see the statues behind us. The gentleman to your right is Jim Rows, it was his vision to build Columbia back almost 50 years ago. Next year will be the 50th anniversary, and so I'm sure he would be a very proud person to know that the city that he planned is now the best place to live in America. So Taylor here grew up in Maryland. He had the good fortune, or misfortune to grow up in Montgomery County, Maryland. If some body like Taylor, who has a family, wanted to look for a best place to live, why would they want to come to Columbia? My gosh! Why wouldn't you want to come to Columbia? We have 3600 acres of open space, 94 miles of pathways We have the greatest schools in the world here in Howard County. We have a great community college right here in Columbia, one of the best community colleges in the country. We have the premier hospital, Howard County General Hospital, in Columbia, part of the Johns Hopkins Medical System. We have Merriweather Post Pavilion. We have the greatest library system in North America. I mean, why else would you want to come to Columbia? Sounds great. Is there room for us there? [ LAUGH ] There's always room for you in Columbia. We are growing, we have a downtown that's becoming more urbanized, it's what we've always needed in Howard county. So Columbia, the ten villages have really helped us become, A great county and brought a lot of diversity, a lot of strength to our community. And again, it was a vision of Jim Rowe's to bring people from all income, all races, all ethnic groups together. And it really has proved to be successful here. What's been the biggest change you've seen over time with Columbia? There's no question that the growth of Columbia, the number of people. I actually will be 58 years old next month, so I was here before Columbia. I don't tell people I grew up in Columbia. I tell them I grew up with Columbia. I tell you, as you see the changes and you see the villages become stronger, you see the new villages, the older villages are being revitalized, we're working on several villages now to revise them. I mean Columbia just continues to attract people because of just the warmth of the people who live here and just all the amenities that people have to enjoy. Allen, one of the things that we factor into our choices for best places, which we did quite a bit this year, is diversity. We feel it's really important for anybody, if we're gonna tell you this is the best place to live We want a place that anybody's gonna feel comfortable and anybody can afford. Can you talk a little bit about the diversity of Columbia and how it's special in that way? I can sure tell you that when I was born Howard county was not a very diverse county and Columbia started 50 years, well 49 years ago. 50 years next year, and that was one of the visions Jim Roust had. A place where people of all ethnic and all racial and all income levels could come live. So we have really made it a passion to make sure that we have affordable housing here in Howard County. We're doing that here in Downtown Columbia. But Columbia does; it's very diverse. I remember when I was younger, as Columbia was being built, you would see interracial marriages, which was not uncommon here in Columbia. And you would see people playing together. You have young people who have all different ethnic, all different races, all playing together in parks. It's just a unique place to be. A place where you feel welcome from the minute you come here, and I'm sure that's what Jim Ralph wanted to have happen. And it has really come to fruition. What's your favorite place to grab a bite? What's your favorite place to get some coffee? That's not fair. [ LAUGH ] Now you're gonna put him on the spot. That's not fair! [ LAUGH ] That's really not fair. But since I'm at the lakefront I'll say Clyde's is here. We have Whole Foods. [ INAUDIBLE ] me as well. We have a lot of great plays to go in [ UNKNOWN ] is wonderful French cuisine so we have so many different [ INAUDIBLE ]. That's another great thing about Columbia. If you want to go to a restaurant you can go to any type of restaurant. All different cuisines are here in Columbia [ INAUDIBLE ] here. You mentioned Jim Ralph a couple of times, the founder of Columbia. But little known fact outside of Columbia is his grandson also grew up in Columbia. And I don't know, does Ed Norton drop into town at all? He comes once in a while. I don't see him that often, but I'm sure he's pretty busy. Young man but yeah, he's a product of Columbia, he also used to act at Toby's dinner theater which is just down the road from where we are, one of the premier places to go in downtown Columbia, so Yeah, no, he certainly is a proud native of Columbia. Cool. Well thank you very much. Congratulations. Congratulations. I hope everybody there is as excited as we are. Columbia is beautiful. [ APPLAUSE ] [ LAUGH ] Thank you so much. Well, thank you for joining us and we'll be moving in next week. We look forward to having you here. all right. Thank you Columbia, take care. Bye bye. With that one said, Columbia residents are obviously very proud of their community. We sent our video team to Maryland to check out what Columbia has to offer. And brought back this video. Take a look. [ MUSIC ] [ LAUGH ] [ MUSIC ] We love Columbia, Maryland. There's a lot of things that brought us here. My wife, in 2009, [ INAUDIBLE ] that. From Money Magazine, that was one of the best places to live. And we loved it. [ MUSIC ] It's a great place to raise your family. I grew up here and moved away for graduate school and came back, knowing that I wanted to live in this area. [ MUSIC ] It's a multi- cultural area. I raised my kids here and Just everybody got along. [ MUSIC ] We love our community, our neighbors, all the kids come out play together, have a good time. We're all here and we're all in this community together. My girls, I want them to grow up around this type of community in Columbia, Maryland, being open and having that insight on everything with what the world has to offer and I think that's what Columbia has to offer What do you want in your sushi? [ MUSIC ] You know everybody. You come here, you know the people, just a great place. [ MUSIC ] It is so diverse. And it has all the amenities That you could want in a place to live. And it's a full sense of community. I feel like it's a real community. So I like that. [ MUSIC ] Columbia is a choice. Like the people who are here are choosing to be here and choosing to make this place what it is . >> One, All right. Let's go. [ INAUDIBLE ] [ MUSIC ] So welcome back from Columbia, Maryland. Pretty, right? People there obviously enjoy living in Columbia, but let's count down this years Top Ten best places to live. Number ten was Naperville, Illinois. Number nine, Beaverton, Oregon. Number eight, Weston, Florida. Number seven, Clarkstown, New York. Six was Highlands Ranch, Colorado. Five, [ INAUDIBLE ] New Jersey. Four, west Des Moines, Iowa. Not east. Three, Plano, Texas. Two, Eden Prairie, Minnesota. And the number one best place to live 2016 Money magazine . >> Columbia, Maryland . >> There you go Taylor. What did you learn that you hadn't learned. You didn't know someplace before. I learned there is as many jobs as people in Eden Prairie . >> Isn't that cool . >> That's insane . >> I know, it's amazing . >> So what was your favorite thing helming this project? You know, I'm a New Yorker, so I think the world begins and ends like that New Yorker painting, right out side the Hudson River. [ LAUGH ] There are 823 places that I got to explore a little bit. Many many of them look like they would be a great place that even I would want to live. Great places to raise your family, if I needed a new job perhaps in the near future, So that's kind of exciting. Of the top ten what would be your favorite place to go? Gosh, I don't know. You know, I've never been to Portland. So Beaverton might be fun. But Eden Prairie sounds cool. You enjoyed Weston. I'm not gonna pick. You're not choose? I'm not that picky, yeah. I think we have one more question from the Peanut Gallery. Yes. I have another question. Add some more insight into this process for America. How important is diversity? So, yes, we were talking about the guy the Clint E. Marilyn. So, diversity is a huge factor in what we do. We rule out places that don't have enough diversity. If any town has 90 % or more of any one ethnic group, we don't really think that makes it a best place to live. That's sort of an automatic disqualification. But beyond that we're looking for places that, you know, you could probably find lots of places that were 50 % of this ethnic group and 50 % that ethnic group. Right. And they live on opposite sides of the railroad tracks, that's not the kind of diversity that we're talking about. So we also work very hard to find places where there's integration among the groups in the city or the town. So that it really feels like home whoever you might be. That's wonderful. Well I'm glad that we cam to this. I'm glad we had this time together. I'm glad we really did, it was precious. [ LAUGH ] Well thank you Facebook, thank you Money Readers people of Columbia Maryland, take care. And come back next year to find out who next year's winner might be. Absolutely. There's tons and tons and tons of data and stories on money. com right now, featuring million cities. Best places to live if you're single, healthiest place, best tax rates, yeah. Go to money. com and you can find all you need. Well thank you, Mark. Thank you, Taylor. And thank you, America. Take care. 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