DARTMOUTH is a top town – as everyone who lives here knows, according to mayor Rob Lyon.
'It's a special place,' he said. 'I sailed in one day and liked it so much I came back. I kept my boat here for 12 years and then decided to move here.'
Cllr Lyon was endorsing the findings of a best places guide, where Dartmouth was named as the favourite location by the sea in a list of the top 50 best towns and suburbs in which to live.
Dartmouth is one of six locations in the South West to feature in the list, compiled by the Sunday Times.
The others are Wadebridge in Cornwall, Castle Cary in Somerset, Thornbury in Gloucestershire, and Bradford-on-Avon and Marlborough in Wiltshire.
The guide combines data and statistics such as crime rates, house prices and school performance with the local knowledge and expertise of Sunday Times writers.
The locations were selected for offering the best quality of life to the widest number of people, and combining desirable features such as a positive community spirit, good local shops and services and attractive outdoor spaces.
Meanwhile, Totnes has been named as the best place in the country to snap up a second home. But its one accolade that the town can do without, its mayor Jacqi Hodgson said.
Totnes came top of the list of the 30 most ideal spots to buy a second home in an article published in The Times.
The report even publicised the fact that you can pick up a terraced Victorian cottage for around £250,000 or a 'sizeable period home' for £750,000 – while highlighting the current development going ahead at the Baltic Wharf next to the River Dart in Totnes as 'one to watch'.
But Ms Hodgson was scathing of The Times' four-page report as she said: 'In terms of second homes it just reinforces the problems that we already have.
'The more second homes and wealthy people coming in from the cities looking to take early retirement the more difficult it is for young people and people on lower incomes to buy their own home and remain in the community where they were born. It's disappointing in terms of publicity for Totnes.'
She said that in some of the South Hams, with so many second homes concentrated in 'favoured areas', that for parts of the year become 'dead zones'.
She added: 'Second homes don't contribute to our schools or a lot of daily life.'
John Witherow, editor of The Times, owns a second home at East Portlemouth.