Here's a migraine for would-be Bay Area homebuyers and a source of probably undeserved self-congratulations for those who bought a place here in, say, the 1990s, and have stuck around to build up some equity: An updated tally of U.S. home prices finds that 38 of the 100 most expensive ZIP codes in the nation are in our nine-county region.

Real estate research firm PropertyShark.com says ZIP code 94027, in the Silicon Valley suburb of Atherton, is the most expensive in the Bay Area, based on 2016 sales prices, and No. 2 in the entire country with a median property price of $5.425 million.

The top area on the national list, 11962, is Sagaponack, New York, in Long Island's wealthy Hamptons, with a 2016 median sales price of $5.5 million. (A math reminder: median is the midpoint in a range of values -- here, we're talking home prices -- with half the values below that point and half above.)

The PropertyShark list shows that eight of the 10 top Bay Area ZIP codes are in or adjacent to Silicon Valley, including two areas in Palo Alto and two in Los Altos. Twelve ZIP codes in the region have recorded median sales prices of $2 million or more this year.

In terms of national and state bragging rights -- if having so much housing stock rise beyond the reach of all but the most wealthy or daring is anything to brag about -- the San Francisco Bay region appears to have the most ZIP codes (38, remember) in the national Top 100. Los Angeles and Orange counties, which as ignorant norteños we're treating as a single metro area, have 28 ZIP codes in that top tier.