ABSTRACT
The city of Santa Monica is famous for many reasons. From its pier being a premier tourist destination for the entire west coast, sprawling medical campuses that include several of the top hospitals in the country, parks, and beaches, the number of landmarks in the town is only rivaled by its home prices, as the median home value for the city is over $1.4 million dollars, by far the highest of this study. Interestingly enough, Santa Monica’s median household income is $98,300, which is lower than other cities in this study such as Naperville and Roswell. Part of this disparity can be attributed to owner occupancy of its housing. In Santa Monica, only 27.9% of owners occupy housing, while in Naperville and Roswell, owner-occupation rates are both above 70%. The city utilizes a council-manager system of government and at-large, nonpartisan elections.
