The Real Cost of Owning in East Hampton and Amagansett
East Hampton Village and the hamlet of Amagansett are covered together on this site under one destination, and any honest look at ownership costs here has to say plainly what it cannot say: no exact current, confirmed 2026 median home price, property tax rate, or flood insurance premium specific to East Hampton Village or Amagansett was found during this research pass. That gap is not a small caveat in a market like this one. East Hampton Village grew out of a 1648 Puritan settlement into a summer-colony destination for artists and, later, Gilded-Age-scale estates, while Amagansett -- settled in 1680 -- is home to the Devon Colony, an enclave built by Procter & Gamble executives on generational, understated wealth whose properties rarely enter the public real estate market at all and maintain real price discretion by design. Those are two different reasons why a simple "median price" figure is hard to pin down here, and this page will not invent one to fill the gap. What follows is the honest context: how these two places came to carry the reputations they carry, what is and is not knowable about cost from public research, and who to actually ask for current numbers before making a decision that size.
Two Places, One Page: An Artist Colony and a Deliberately Quiet Enclave
East Hampton Village traces to 1648, when Puritan settlers laid out plantations around a wide common -- today's Main Street area -- on the plain north of Hook Pond, with home lots of 8 to 12 acres flanking that common and surrounding farmland divided into the Eastern Plain, Great Plain, and Little Plain. Structures from that era and the centuries after still stand, including Hook Mill, Gardiner Windmill, and the Home Sweet Home house, restored under the direction of Historic District Consultant Robert J. Hefner. In the final quarter of the 1800s, artists discovered the area's agrarian landscape and a summer colony took shape: modest shingled cottages rose near Ocean Avenue and Lily Pond Lane on the Great Plain, while the Eastern Plain came to host sizable estates by the early 1900s -- the start of East Hampton's long identity as a wealthy summer destination, built on an artist-colony foundation rather than invented from nothing.
Amagansett has its own, separate founding: settled in 1680, its name derived from a Montaukett-language phrase meaning "place of good water," by families including Baker, Conklin, and Barnes, along with Dutch brothers Abraham and Jacob Schellinger who arrived between 1680 and 1690. In the late 19th century, Procter & Gamble executives established the Devon Colony there, an exclusive enclave built around generational legacy and understated wealth rather than public display. That is a genuinely different identity from East Hampton Village's artist-colony-to-Gilded-Age arc, and a buyer weighing this combined market should treat the two places as related neighbors with distinct characters, not one interchangeable "Hamptons" blob.
Why the Devon Colony Makes a Simple Median Price Hard to Trust
The Devon Colony is the clearest reason cost figures for this market deserve extra skepticism. Its properties rarely enter the public real estate market and maintain real price discretion as a matter of longstanding practice among owners whose wealth is generational rather than newly displayed. No specific current Devon Colony property count, sale price, or named owning family beyond the general description "Procter & Gamble executives" was confirmed in this research, and none is invented here. When a meaningful share of a small area's most significant properties simply do not transact publicly, or transact quietly through private channels, any published "average" or "median" for the wider area is describing the visible market, not the whole one -- and a buyer should understand that distinction before treating any headline number as complete.
East Hampton and the broader Hamptons carry a well-known public reputation as among the most expensive residential real estate markets in the United States. That reputation is real and worth taking seriously as directional context, but a reputation is not a confirmed 2026 price, and this page treats it as exactly that: a signal that costs here run well above typical national and regional benchmarks, not a substitute for a verified current figure from a licensed professional working this specific market today.
What the Population and Income Data Actually Show -- and Its Limits
Public demographic data offers some anchoring context, though it should not be read as a cost figure either. The Town of East Hampton, which encompasses both East Hampton Village and Amagansett hamlet among other areas, had a 2020 census population of 28,385, up from 21,457 in 2010, with a July 2025 estimate of 29,400 -- a 3.7 percent increase from April 2020 -- and a town-wide population density of 381.9 people per square mile as of 2020. East Hampton Village specifically had a 2024 population estimate of 1,297 and a 2026 projected estimate of 1,553; these are third-party estimates, not Census Bureau-confirmed figures at the village level for those specific years, and the same source reported a 49.3 percent population change from 2019 to 2024, an annual rate of change of 9.9 percent. No official Census Bureau hamlet-level population figure for Amagansett specifically was found in this research -- only the Town-wide, Census-confirmed numbers above and the flagged third-party village estimate.
Within that same village-level estimate, median household income for 2024 was reported at $106,250, with a poverty rate of 3.4 percent of families, a median age of 57.5 years, and a race and ethnicity breakdown of 68.5 percent White, 25.8 percent Hispanic, and 2.6 percent two or more races. Those figures describe who lives in East Hampton Village today -- an older, higher-income, low-poverty population consistent with a longstanding wealthy resort community -- but income data is not price data, and it should not be used to back into an estimated home value or tax bill. Treat it as background on the community a buyer would be joining, not as an input to a purchase decision.
What We Will Not Invent, and Who to Ask Instead
This page will not state a current median home price, price-per-square-foot figure, active listing count, current property tax rate, or current flood insurance premium for East Hampton Village or Amagansett, because none was independently confirmed during this research pass. It will not invent a specific Devon Colony sale price or property count where the market itself is built to avoid disclosing one. And it will not treat the general reputation of the Hamptons as expensive as a stand-in for an actual number a buyer could rely on in a contract.
Before making an offer in either East Hampton Village or Amagansett, get current figures directly from professionals working this specific market: a local real estate agent who can speak to recent comparable sales, including how much of the relevant inventory is even visible on the public market; the Town of East Hampton tax assessor's office for the actual current property tax rate and assessment on a specific parcel; and a licensed insurance broker for a current flood insurance quote, since coastal Long Island premiums vary by flood zone, elevation, and structure in ways a general area reputation cannot capture. Nothing on this page is legal, tax, insurance, or financial advice.
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Get a Free Agent Referral →Independent research. No ads. No sponsored listings. Data drawn from research on East Hampton Village and Amagansett hamlet, New York, including East Hampton Village's 1648 founding by Puritan settlers who laid out plantations around a wide common (today's Main Street area) on the plain north of Hook Pond, with home lots of 8 to 12 acres and surrounding farmland divided into the Eastern Plain, Great Plain, and Little Plain; historic structures including Hook Mill, Gardiner Windmill, and the Home Sweet Home house, restored under Historic District Consultant Robert J. Hefner; the final-quarter-of-the-1800s artist-colony development with modest shingled cottages near Ocean Avenue and Lily Pond Lane on the Great Plain and sizable estates on the Eastern Plain by the early 1900s; Amagansett's 1680 settlement (name derived from a Montaukett-language phrase meaning "place of good water") by the Baker, Conklin, and Barnes families and Dutch brothers Abraham and Jacob Schellinger (arrived 1680-1690); the late-19th-century founding of the Devon Colony by Procter & Gamble executives as an exclusive, generational-wealth enclave whose properties rarely enter the public real estate market and maintain price discretion, with no specific current property count, price, or named family beyond "Procter & Gamble executives" confirmed; Town of East Hampton census population of 28,385 (2020), 21,457 (2010), and a July 2025 estimate of 29,400 (up 3.7 percent from April 2020), with town-wide 2020 population density of 381.9 per square mile; East Hampton Village-specific third-party estimates of 1,297 (2024) and a 2026 projection of 1,553, a reported 49.3 percent population change from 2019 to 2024 (9.9 percent annual rate of change), 2024 median household income of $106,250, poverty rate of 3.4 percent of families, median age of 57.5 years, and race/ethnicity of 68.5 percent White, 25.8 percent Hispanic, and 2.6 percent two or more races -- all explicitly flagged as third-party estimates rather than confirmed Census figures at the village level for those years. No official Census Bureau hamlet-level population figure for Amagansett specifically was found. No exact current (2026) median home price, property tax rate, or flood insurance premium specific to East Hampton Village or Amagansett was independently confirmed this research pass, and none is invented here; the general public reputation of the Hamptons as one of the most expensive real estate markets in the United States is presented only as directional context, not as a substitute for a verified current figure. This page does not reuse Montauk's lighthouse, Carl Fisher, or Camp Hero history, or Red Bank, New Jersey's Navesink River material -- East Hampton Village's and Amagansett's founding, artist-colony, and Devon Colony histories are their own. Confirm current price, tax, and insurance figures with a local real estate agent, the Town of East Hampton tax assessor's office, and a licensed insurance broker before making any purchase decision. Nothing on this page is legal, tax, insurance, or financial advice.