Named after the city of Chester, England, Westchester County is located in the New York metropolitan area, just north of New York City. It is bordered on the west side by the Hudson River and on the east side by the Long Island Sound and Fairfield County, Connecticut.

Westchester's Long Island Sound shore is home to several large harbors including Milton Harbor in Rye, Mamaroneck Harbor, Larchmont Harbor, and Echo Bay, and the upper and lower harbors in southern New Rochelle.

Two bridges span the Hudson in Westchester: the Bear Mountain Bridge crosses at Cortlandt and the Tappan Zee Bridge at Tarrytown.

With a population of 999,723, Westchester has a lot to offer: proximity to NYC, top-rated school districts, arts institutions, healthcare, Michelin-rated restaurants, shopping, craft breweries, but it comes at a price. Property taxes are the highest in the nation, median single-family home price is $655,000, and median household income is $92,758.

However, Westchester offers options for those with smaller pockets - affordable rental options from Yonkers and New Rochelle to Chappaqua and Pleasantville, with hundreds of affordable units. For potential homeowners, it is still possible to find fixer-upper houses under $500,000.

What makes Westchester County attractive? The quality of its schools, and colleges. SUNY Purchase College was ranked one of the top ten public colleges in the “National Liberal Arts Colleges” report by U.S. News & World Report, while The Princeton Review counted Purchase among the “Top 385 Colleges” in the nation.

Population - 967,506, Land Area - 431 SQ MI