The Bezos family, which is the richest in the world , lives in the tiny waterfront city of Medina, Washington, located just outside of Seattle.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates is perhaps the most famous fellow resident, although the town's inhabitants include numerous other Microsoft bigwigs, tech entrepreneurs, and telecom magnates.
We visited in January 2018 to see why the sleepy town has become a haven for the 1%.
Medina is located on a peninsula just across Lake Washington from Seattle, and it has long been a haven for tech bigwigs in the area.
Visitors enter the town from the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge. Measuring 7,708 feet in length, it is the longest floating bridge in the world.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Medina is a city of about 3,000 people. The Medina Beach Park doubles as the city hall and police station.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The city has a spectacular view of Seattle, Lake Washington, and the surrounding area. You feel miles away from Seattles bustling downtown from here.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Almost all of the houses on the water in Medina have a dock and a small private beach. Lake Washington is a popular place for swimming, water sports, and boating in the summer.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The town is filled with evergreens. Medina was designated as a Tree City by the Arbor Day Foundation in 2006.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
While the roads are lined with evergreens and shrubs, the houses tend have their own distinct vegetation and landscaping. This property was dotted with palms.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The best-known street in the city is Evergreen Point Road. Because the road runs along the water, it is a whos who of luxury real estate. Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, and several Microsoft executives live on the street.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Evergreen Point Road, like most of Medina, was very quiet. A car passed here or there, but for the most part the neighborhood was eerily peaceful.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
That is, until a police car rolled up moments after I took this photo. The officer said a neighbor had called about me walking around. It was an unsettling moment. I had been in Medina less than 15 minutes.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The town is almost entirely residential. The Medina Grocery & Deli and this post office appear to be the only sources of commercial activity.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
There is a mural on the side of the post office recounting the incorporation of Medina in 1955. The city was first settled in 1891 and named after a city in Saudi Arabia.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The Wells Medina Nursery, a plant store about a mile from the post office, is the only other store in town. Most shopping can be done in nearby Bellevue.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The houses on the waterfront side of Evergreen Point Road were all blocked by high gates. The mansions looked massive, but it was hard to see inside.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The landscaping on most of the properties was impeccable.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
These "lending libraries" were dotted on some of the streets, and the town is filled with expansive and beautiful parks.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Cameras, motion sensors, and other forms of surveillance are outside every house on the waterfront side.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The houses on the other side of Evergreen Point Road are still elaborate, but not on the same level as the waterfront properties.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Just up the road from the post office and grocery store is Jeff Bezos house. There isnt much to see. A tall gate and hedges block any view from the road. Bezos estate spans 5.3 acres and includes a 20,000-square-foot house and an 8,300-square-foot house.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Bezos paid $10 million for the estate in 1998, but it underwent a $28 million renovation in 2010, around which time he bought the 24,000-square-foot house next door. That house was rumored to have sold for at least $53 million.
In 2009, Medina installed city-wide surveillance that included cameras at every intersection and a system that automatically cross-references license plates with crime databases. It was criticized by activists, but a council member told The Seattle Times that crime prevention "outweighs concern over privacy."
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
City council members deny they are trying to create a gated-community atmosphere, but considering my run-in with a police officer while simply walking on sidewalks with a camera, thats exactly what it felt like.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Bill Gates lives about a half mile up the road from Bezos in this $125 million compound he nicknamed "Xanadu 2.0." The 66,000-square-foot house is brimming with state-of-the-art technology.
Of course, it has a spectacular view of Lake Washington. The house has a 23-car garage, six kitchens, 24 bathrooms, and a reception hall that can accommodate 200 guests.
AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, Pool
The Overlake Country Club in Medina has been open since 1927. Membership to the club is only by invitation.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The billionaire Charles Simonyi owns this house known as Villa Simonyi, or the "Windows 2000 House," because it has 2,000 windows. Simonyi made his fortune heading up the Microsoft unit that created Word and Excel.
If you think youd like to move to Medina, this house just off the second fairway of the country club is listed for $7.2 million. It has seven bedrooms, nine bathrooms, and a "brilliant open floor plan."
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
This 6,120-square-foot house is also on the market. A cool $7.56 million buys you a five-bedroom, six-bath designed by the famed interior decorator Nate Berkus.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The median home value in Medina is $1.56 million, and the median household income is $174,000. But not all the houses in Medina are extravagant. There are many simpler abodes, like the one pictured here.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The town adjacent to Medina, Hunts Point, isnt anything to sneeze at either. With about 500 residents, its median household income is slightly higher at $180,000. The median property value is $2 million.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
The entire town is a single evergreen-lined road called Hunts Point Road.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, who owns the Los Angeles Clippers, lives in Hunts Point. The relatively modest house has only four bedrooms and is located on 2 acres.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Next door to Ballmer is this estate, owned by the Seattle telecom billionaire Craig McCaw, who founded McCaw Cellular (which was purchased by AT&T). McCaw purchased the house from the saxophonist Kenny G.
Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
SEE ALSO: The world's richest people are flocking to these 17 cities
DON'T MISS: Meet the kids of the world's richest tech billionaires
