Zillow has just trotted out its 10 hottest neighborhoods for 2017 in the San Jose and San Francisco metro areas — and they’re not necessarily the ones you would have predicted.

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26-story housing highrise eyed in downtown San Jose Yes, several are in Palo Alto: the Old Palo Alto, University South and Duveneck-St. Francis neighborhoods, all with homes valued in the millions of dollars.

But in the San Jose metro area, the rest are in Sunnyvale and San Jose, in neighborhoods known for modest homes that can still be had for $1 million or less — some in the $600,000 range. The San Jose metro area includes Santa Clara and San Benito counties.

And in the San Francisco metropolitan area — which includes Marin, San Mateo, Contra Costa and Alameda counties — all 10 of the “hottest” neighborhoods are in Oakland, some with prices as low as the $300,000 range.

These are the places where prices are poised to grow the fastest in 2017, Zillow predicts.

“This is a theme we’ve been seeing in many neighborhoods around the country,” said Svenja Gudell, Zillow’s chief economist. “Neighborhoods that are slightly less expensive but still close to other, more desirable neighborhoods are starting to get a spillover effect. … They still have a lot of head-room to grow, value-wise.”

Oakland is the prime example. “So many people are interested in that area, because it’s so easy to commute to San Francisco, and it’s still possible to find a home,” Gudell said.

For this definition of “hotness,” she said, Zillow “simply focused on the price point and how far values are expected to grow. A different definition of hotness might include crime statistics, school ratings, parks, amenities, walkability … . But that’s not what we’re doing here.”

After years of rapid appreciation, home prices in the San Jose metro area are poised to grow by just 0.4 percent in the coming year, Gudell said. In the San Francisco metropolitan area, which includes Oakland, the growth rate is expected to be 1.0 percent.

For Oakland proper, the anticipated growth rate is 3.5 percent.

And East Oakland, where Zillow’s hot neighborhoods are clustered, is “almost like the last frontier,” said Tim Ambrose, president-elect of the Bay East Association of Realtors. “It doesn’t really run that close to BART, and it’s not going to put you into the new, trendy-restaurant kind of area. But look at the prices.”

Zillow puts the median value of a single-family home in Sobrante Park at $355,700.

“You roll the dice,” Ambrose said. “You get to an area that hasn’t been quite gentrified yet and move in there and ride it out. And you have a whole lot of money left over because you haven’t spent $900,000.”

That’s about what it takes to get into some of Sunnyvale’s hot, still relatively affordable neighborhoods. Three of Zillow’s Top 5 for the San Jose metro are in Sunnyvale: the East Murphy, West Murphy and Lakewood Village neighborhoods.

“If you go into any other neighborhoods south of there, the next lowest median price is about $1,360,000,” said Sereno agent Kevin Swartz. “So these are three locations where people can still afford to buy a house, though they’re much smaller.”

The median size of a house sold last year in Lakewood Village, he said, was 1,108 square feet. “They’re flat-topped houses, 1950s-era, but close to the freeway, good for getting to work.”

Likewise, two San Jose neighborhoods on the list — the Fairgrounds and Edenvale-Seven Trees — are places where a new buyer can get a foot in the door, said Intero agent Craig Gorman.

“They’re traditionally more blue-collar neighborhoods,” he said. “They’re areas where the first-time buyer who doesn’t have a $200,000 income can afford to come in and buy a property.”