What America’s Most Expensive ZIP Codes Reveal About Where Wealth Actually Goes

When Realtor.com® ranked the country’s most expensive ZIP codes earlier this year, the numbers were staggering.Fisher Island, FL, was among the top 3 with a median home price of $10.83 million. Water Mill, NY, and Bridgehampton, NY, two enclaves in New York’s Hamptons, were close behind, with median prices approaching or exceeding $8 million.But outside of housing, living in these communities does not cost dramatically more than it does in other affluent parts of the country.Using county-level data from United for ALICE—a nonprofit research initiative that estimates the minimum income households need to cover basic necessities—a family of four would need about $66,000 a year for essentials in Miami-Dade County and roughly $76,000 in Suffolk County, where Water Mill and Bridgehampton are located.Those budgets are significant, but they are dwarfed by housing. Financing the median-priced home in Fisher Island, assuming a 20% down payment and a 30-year mortgage at approximately 6%, pushes the annual cost of ownership to nearly $688,000 before taxes, insurance, HOA fees, and maintenance. Comparable totals reach roughly $582,000 in Bridgehampton and $531,000 in Water Mill.The mortgage al...