If you focus only on the averages, life in the typical American town frankly doesn’t seem so hot right now. The median home continues to lose value. Cash-strapped state and local governments are cutting services. And unemployment, at 9.3%, is still high.

But those bummer statistics obscure one important-and encouraging-fact: There are plenty of outliers. MONEY found them through its annual search for the best places in America, which this year focused on the nation’s small cities (those with populations of 50,000 to 300,000). Reporters crunched reams of data to find the optimal combo of job opportunities, fiscal strength, top-notch schools, low crime, good health care, lots to do, and many other factors that help make a town great for raising a family.

And because numbers don’t tell you anything about charm and community spirit, reporters visited 30 of the highest-ranked towns in person. Those that made the cut landed on MONEY’s top 10 list. As you’ll see, these places are anything but average.

Courtesy: City of Eden Prairie

1. Eden Prairie, MN
Population: 64,000
Unemployment: 5.1%
Pluses: Plenty of jobs, very low crime, lots for kids to do
Minus: Long, cold winters

Why is Eden Prairie No. 1 this year? Not only is it family-friendly, it has a dynamite economy too.

At 5.1%, its unemployment rate is nearly one percentage point below the county rate and more than four points below the national average. It helps when you’ve got 50,000 jobs right in town.

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Major employers include Fortune 500 trucking company C.H. Robinson, hearing-aid maker Starkey Labs, and the Minnesota Vikings, whose practice facility and front office are here. As for fiscal strength, Moody’s gives the town a perfect AAA bond rating.

While it doesn’t have much of a downtown, there’s plenty of outer beauty: from gently rolling hills to 17 lakes that residents flock to year-round for swimming and ice skating. Town parks are laced with 125 miles of running, hiking, and biking trails.

No wonder residents rank among the healthiest people in the nation. Add in top-notch schools and safe streets and you’ve got a place that’s tough to beat.

Courtesy: City of Ellicot City

2. Columbia/Ellicott City, MD
Population: 155,000
Unemployment: 5.2%
Pluses: Booming economy, terrific schools, diversity
Minus: Bad traffic

Ellicott City boasts grand homes, a lovely 18th-century downtown, and lots of restaurants. Columbia offers a wide range of housing, tons of parkland, and a major music venue. But those varied amenities are far from the only reasons this duo has risen to No. 2 from No. 8 in 2008. It’s also an economic powerhouse with a jobless rate just as enviable as Eden Prairie’s.

The nearby National Security Agency and the Fort Meade Army base together account for more than 8,000 jobs, and the government plans to move thousands more positions there by next year.Baltimore and D.C. are within commuting distance (30 and 60 minutes, respectively).

As for housing, the foreclosure rate is one of the lowest in Maryland, yet homes are affordable — by Northeast standards, anyway. Factor in excellent schools and a diverse population (17% of residents are black, 14% Asian), and you can see why this place has become a magnet for families.

Even empty nesters like Alma, 46, and Elmer Gill, 54, who have lived in Columbia for 14 years, appreciate the town’s appeal. Says Alma: “There’s no other place we’d want to live.”

Courtesy: Town of Newton

3. Newton, MA
Population: 82,000
Unemployment: 6.0%
Pluses: Great schools, low crime, strong economy
Minuses: Pricey homes, bad traffic

Less than 45 minutes from downtownBoston via train, subway, or express bus,Newton is divided into 13 “villages” loaded with classic New England charm. Most have pedestrian-friendly shopping districts, parks, and playgrounds.

The town weathered the economic downturn fairly well, thanks to such stable local employers as Boston College and Newton-Wellesley Hospital. And Greater Boston, of course, offers a wealth of health care, education, and government jobs.

Residents rave about the top-ranked schools, and parents are excited for the new high school opening this fall. “It’s absolutely beautiful,” says Claudia Wu, 51, an attorney with three school-age kids who has lived in Newton for 20 years. It should be: The school cost $197 million, an amount that sparked plenty of local outrage.

After all, living in this community is expensive enough: a three-bedroom house runs nearly $600,000. If it weren’t for those hefty price tags, this town would be pretty close to perfect.

Courtesy: Town of Bellevue

4. Bellevue, WA
Population: 124,000
Unemployment: 5.8%
Pluses: Natural beauty, excellent schools, diversity
Minuses: Pricey real estate, rain

If forested cityscapes are your thing, this is your kind of place. Bellevue’s compact downtown bristles with new skyscrapers that seem to hover above Lake Washington — and when the clouds part, mountain views loom.

Real estate isn’t a bargain, but the town’s jobless rate is more than two points below that of theSeattle metro area, thanks to a recent influx of jobs from such employers as Microsoft (which has moved 6,500 positions here), T-Mobile, Verizon, and Expedia. In fact, Bellevue has more jobs than it does residents.

And the population is diverse: Nearly a quarter of residents are Asian, and nearly a third are foreign born.

The town’s high schools consistently land at the top of state rankings; despite school funding cuts throughout Washington, the town has been able to enhance special ed and gifted programs. There’s an embarrassment of arts and entertainment riches, including a philharmonic orchestra, fine arts museum, children’s museum, botanical garden, youth theater, annual jazz festival, and 74 (!) parks.

Courtesy of McKinney CVB/Beth Shumate

5. McKinney, TX
Population: 125,000
Unemployment: 7.8%
Pluses: Affordable homes, charming downtown
Minus: Traffic headaches

Lots of towns near Dallas have low crime, affordable homes, and good jobs; McKinneyis no exception. What makes it stand out is its gem of a downtown. Lovingly restored 19th-century buildings house restaurants, boutiques, and galleries; the 1875 courthouse contains a new performing-arts center.
McKinney’s employment opportunities are robust, sparing many residents a rush-hour drive of up to an hour to Dallas. Defense contractor Raytheon has a 3,700-person division here, and a mix of businesses in financial services, medical technology, and eco-friendly manufacturing are moving in.

Though McKinney has grown like mad over the past decade, you’d never suspect it when driving through its tree-filled communities surrounded by ponds, parks, and hiking trails. Residents say the town has handled the influx well, building plenty of new schools and hospitals.

And the relatively low real-estate prices thrill transplants from more expensive locales: A five-bedroom house, with a pool, set on a golf course might go for $440,000, and you can find homes for a third as much.

Courtesy of Fort Collins/Ryan Burke

6. Fort Collins, CO
Population: 141,000
Unemployment: 7.4%
Pluses: Outdoor activities, steady economy
Minus: School budget cuts

Bikers and beers. In most parts of the country, those two elements may be reasons to move elsewhere. But in the foothills of Colorado’s Front Range, bikers mean cyclists: Fort Collins has 29 miles of well-used trails.

As for beers, this town has become a high-end microbrew mecca. New Belgium Brewery (maker of Fat Tire) is based in this entrepreneurial town, and competitors are moving in.

People here aren’t slackers either. Bolstered by Colorado State University, which employs 7,000, “the Fort” is a center of economic activity. Hewlett-Packard, the city’s second-largest employer, announced worldwide layoffs in June, but they won’t affect Fort Collins. In fact, the company is adding jobs here.

This idyllic town — No. 1 in 2006 — would rank even higher but for one thing. (No, it’s not last summer’s Balloon Boy hoax, perpetrated by the local Heene family.) Colorado schools are hurting. After the state sliced public schools budget this year, Fort Collins’s Poudre School District laid off 139 full-time employees.

Courtesy of City Overland Park

7. Overland Park, KS
Population: 175,000
Unemployment: 5.3%
Pluses: Good schools, low cost of living
Minuses: Some job losses, not much excitement

Ask residents why they chose this Kansas City suburb and you hear one thing over and over: the schools.

Other draws include a 300-acre arboretum and botanical garden, a biweekly farmers’ market, and a brand-new 12-field soccer complex, which hosts local and national tournaments.

Overland Park’s biggest challenge in recent years has been from its largest employer, Sprint. The company laid off more than 3,000 people here from 2007 to 2009.

But the town has had enough success attracting new employers that its jobless rate is still well below the national average. What’s more, a division of J.P. Morgan plans to move 800 positions here early next year.

Courtesy of Town Fishers

8. Fishers, IN
Population: 69,000
Unemployment: 6.2%
Pluses: Very low crime, inexpensive homes
Minus: Short on charm

This Indiana town offers a winning combination of low-cost houses (you can snag a three-bedroom for less than $150,000), easy access to the big city, and good schools.

Plus, Fishers is booming. Development abounds and fully 1,600 jobs were created here last year; major employers include Sallie Mae and medical device firm Roche Diagnostics.

True, Fishers will never put anyone in mind of a quaint New England village. But thanks to its myriad advantages, including lots of community spirit, residents aren’t complaining.

Sums up Debra O’Donnell, 46, a mother of two: “It’s very easy to live here.”

Courtesy of Iowa State University

9. Ames, IA
Population: 60,000
Unemployment: 4.3%
Pluses: Jobs galore, welcoming vibe
Minus: Cold winters

Unemployment at 4.3%? That’s not a misprint: Ames is the home of Iowa State University, which employs 9,000, and there are lots of biotech and agriculture jobs nearby. Like many states, Iowa has trimmed university funding, but the school has not had to make drastic cuts.

If the people who live here get bored, they have only themselves to blame. Besides Iowa State’s cultural and athletic offerings, Ames boasts 36 parks, a bustling shopping district, and a new aquatic center.

Sports are big in this town: The high school boys basketball team, girls tennis team, and girls golf team are state champions. But the friendliness of the community is what newcomers tend to remark upon most.

Says Craig McFarland, 55, a financial adviser who moved here with his family in 2006: “Our first day, a neighbor came over with cookies.”

Courtesy of Rogers-Lowell Area Chambers of Commerce

10. Rogers, AR
Population: 57,000
Unemployment: 5.8%
Pluses: Low cost of living, diversity
Minus: Strip malls

If you’re inclined to dismiss a small city in Arkansas as a backwater, you’re making a big mistake. Rogers is right next door toBentonville, where Wal-Mart is headquartered.

Given the power of the retail behemoth, many Fortune 500 firms that sell it their wares have moved executives to the area. Lots of them have settled in Rogers, giving it a cosmopolitan feel. (Wal-Mart’s CEO, Mike Duke, also callsRogers home.)

They’re drawn by top-notch schools and outdoor activities, including swimming and wakeboarding on the town’s two lakes and golfing on its five courses.

(Not all is picture perfect: Rogers does contain some rundown areas.) Though Wal-Mart has had layoffs in recent years, the jobless rate here remains low.

See the full list of the 100 Best Places to Live in America

Les Christie, staff writer, CNNMoney.com

May 21st, 2010

Top 5 Most Affordable Cities

1. (tie): Indianapolis

Median home price: $96,000
Median income: $68,700
Affordability score: 94.9%

America’s most affordable housing market is the 33rd largest metro area in the United States, with 1.7 million people.

The median family income is fairly high — $68,700 — and median home prices are a very reasonable $96,000, according to the National Association of Homebuilders and Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index.

Helping keep home prices depressed is a fairly virulent foreclosure plague: There were more than 18,400 properties with foreclosure filings during 2009.

The turmoil in the auto industry, which Indianapolis had been closely associated with, has hurt the city. But increased diversification, which has made pharmaceutical companies, banks government agencies and insurers all important employers, has helped keep job losses in check. The unemployment rate was 9.5% in March, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nearly matching the national rate of 9.7% that month.

2. (tie): Youngstown, Ohio

Median home price: $69,000
Median income: $53,500
Affordability score: 94.9%

Youngstown was a vibrant, wealthy steel city for many decades. Workers there were paid some of the highest factory wages anywhere.

But the mill closings of the late 1970s devastated the area’s economy, and about 40,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost. In March, 14% of workers in the area were idle.

As jobs vanished, the area’s population shrank, leaving lots of vacant homes for sale — from very modest row houses to huge mansions. That helps keep the median home price in the metro area very low — and boosts Youngstown’s affordability score.

Low interest rates also help. Financing 80% of a $69,000 home with a 30-year, fixed rate mortgage at 5% would result in a monthly payment of $296. At those kinds of prices, renters soon become homebuyers.

3. Syracuse, N.Y.

Median home price: $95,000
Median income: $64,300
Affordability score: 94.5%

A newcomer to the list, Syracuse is one of the many Upstate New York cities that grew up along the route of the Erie Canal, which made them wealthy. Syracuse’s importance as a transportation hub continues to this day, with two major interstates crossing here.

Much of the area’s economic base depended on manufacturing, and many of those industries have declined. While the metro area’s population has expanded modestly, the core city has shrunk to fewer than 140,000 from a post-war high of 220,000. That shrinkage means there’s much housing stock, keeping home prices very low.

The economy slowed during the recession and unemployment grew, but the rate — 8.5% during March — is still lower than the national average.

4. Dayton, Ohio

Median home price: $88,000
Median income: $61,700
Affordability score: 94.4%

The hometown of Wilbur and Orville Wright, Dayton still hosts a significant aerospace industry centered on the Wright-Paterson Air Force base

But the decline of heavy industry — including last year’s loss of the headquarters for NCR Corp., the old National Cash Register Co., to Duluth, Ga. — has pushed the city toward the service economy for job growth. That has not stemmed the unemployment tide; the rate stood at 12.3% in March.

The core city’s population has dropped from a peak of more than 260,000 in 1960 to about 150,000 today. The metro area population has also dropped slightly over the past 10 years, according to Census Bureau estimates.

That has lessened demand for homes and helped keep prices low; the median has hovered around $100,000, more or less, the entire decade. At the same time, median income has grown from about $55,000 to more than $62,000. That increase, coupled with very low mortgage rates, made home buying extremely affordable.

5: Grand Rapids, Mich.
Median home price: $102,000
Median income: $62,500
Affordability score: 93.7%

This medium-sized, western Michigan city flourished during the 19th century by turning nearby hardwood forests into furniture. Golden oak cabinets, dining tables and chairs once crafted in the area can now be spotted in many an antique store around the nation. Today, it still is a leading manufacturer of office furniture.

The metro area, like much of the industrial Midwest, has seen better days. Besides furniture, it also had a robust auto manufacturing base, which has declined along with the rest of the industry. Grand Rapids economy is now more diversified with health services an important employer. Still, many people are out of work; the metro area’s 12.8% unemployment rate is more than three percentage points higher than the national average.

The people who are employed make decent wages, over $62,000 for the median household, more than enough to afford a nice house.

There are many hundreds of homes for sale in the metro area for less than $90,000.

Top 5 Least Affordable Cities

1. New York

Median home price: $426,000
Median income: $65,600
Affordability score: 20.9%

Home prices can be staggeringly high in the New York City metro area, but median income is not commensurately high; it’s under $65,000. That combo makes this the country’s least affordable major metro area.

Affordability has improved lately: The median home price has fallen from about $500,000 at the market peak, and more properties are within reach now that mortgage rates are near historic lows.

After holding up better and longer than most housing markets, sales and prices around New York City have started to experience greater declines. The market is highly influenced by what’s happening on Wall Street; when financial markets sneeze, the real estate industry says “God bless you” with feeling.

Financial markets have stabilized a bit lately and investment banks are paying out bonuses. That could hasten a housing market recovery in the metro area.

2. San Francisco

Median home price: $585,000
Median income: $98,400
Affordability score: 23.4%

Home prices in the Bay Area rose during the last three months of 2009, dropping the percentage of affordable homes sold to 23.4.

Still, prices are way off from the heady days of 2006, when a median-priced house sold for $769,000, according to the NAHB-Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index. Now the median home is only $585,000.

It’s a good thing the area’s median income comes to a whopping $98,400, among the highest in the nation. Unemployment, however, is growing, and the 11% rate for the metro area puts it well above the national average.

That has contributed to the foreclosures that continue to plague the Bay Area. RealtyTrac figures show a total of more than 54,000 homes with filings in 2009.

3. Honolulu

Median home price: $403,000
Median income: $81,700
Affordability score: 34.7%

The biggest city and metro area in the Aloha State has been an expensive place to live for decades; little developable land and the need to import building materials from far away helped inflate home prices.

Median home prices have bounced around a lot, topping out at around $585,000 during the last three months of 2007 and dropping to $360,000 in the first quarter of 2009. They bounced back to $403,000 in early 2010.

The economy is as heavily dependent on tourism as any American city, and that industry has suffered as more Americans think twice about taking expensive vacations. Hotel occupancy rates declined for 18 consecutive months before starting to rise again last September. They have been up nearly every month since.

The metro area’s official unemployment rate stood at just 5.6% in March, well below the national average.

Foreclosures have been a mild but rapidly increasing problem, with just 3,985 properties having a foreclosure filings during 2009, according to RealtyTrac. That was 128th among 203 metro areas covered. That represented, however, a 671% increase over 2008.

If that trend continues, it could unleash a host of distressed properties on the market, which should bring down prices and raise affordability.

4. Santa Ana, Calif.

Median home price: $410,000
Median income: $87,300
Affordability score: 34.5%

Many of the booming Orange County economies were driven by the once-swelling housing bubble. Thousands of jobs were created in construction, the real estate industry, retail and mortgage lending. Once that bubble burst, a lot of these jobs disappeared.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics counts Santa Ana as part of the Los Angeles metro area for calculating unemployment rate and that, at 11.7% in March, was above the national average. Home prices have dropped substantially from the high they hit back in mid-2006, when the median Santa Ana home sold for $630,000. Prices have plummeted since; in the first three months of 2009, the median price was just $410,000. That caused affordability to improve but still only 34.5% of the homes sold were comfortably open to median-income earners.

5: Los Angeles

Median home price: $306,000
Median income: $62,900
Affordability score: 35.9%

As the post-war City of Angels filled in and up, with the population exploding to nearly 4 million in town and 13 million in the metro area, the area has mostly run out of land to build on. That has led to much higher development costs and home prices.

Still, L.A. values have fallen far from the bubble years, off nearly 40% since mid-2006. Affordability is improved as well, with 35.9% of homes sold falling in a range that median income earners could comfortably pay for.

With prices much lower and unemployment at 11.7%, many area homeowners are having a tough time staying out of foreclosure; there were filings on nearly 176,000 homes last year, the highest total for any metro area.

All those properties coming back on the market has depressed prices that would otherwise be far less affordable than they are now.

Read more about where home prices are most affordable.

To be considered for the list, a community is nominated at RelocateAmerica.com. From the thousands of submissions, RelocateAmerica.com’s editorial team reviews the nominations and selects the Top 100 Places to Live, as well as the Top 10 for each smaller category, based on interviews with local leaders; feedback from residents; and economic, environmental, education, crime, employment and housing data for the past year.

“Given the tough economic times our nation is facing, homebuyers have re-evaluated their priorities and are looking to relocate to communities that offer plenty of perks, but minimal hassle and cost,” said Peter Meyers, Vice President, Research and Content Development, at RelocateAmerica.com. “While some cities are facing a road to recovery that could take years, others are poised for a quick rebound – and already have seen growth. We wanted to highlight those cities that are on the road back to economic health.”

This marks one of several national awards the town has received in 2010. The following is a list of accolades:

• Best Place to Raise Your Kids – BusinessWeek.com
• #1 Best Affordable Suburb in U.S.- BusinessWeek.com
• #2 Best Under-rated Golf Community in U.S. - Livability.com
• Healthiest County in Indiana - Community Health Network
• Top 100 Places to Live in 2010  - RelocateAmerica

Fishers, Indiana

Located 2 minutes from I-69, this 7-yr-old, 2,600 sq. ft. home features an open lower level with dining, living & family rooms. The large kitchen has ample cabinets along with large eating area. The second floor has a huge bonus/game room area & 3 bedrooms. The huge master suite features a sitting area, large bath and walk-in closet. Large garage & nice landscaping with a fully fenced back yard! Large community park & pool within walking distance. Hamilton Town Center within five minutes!