BusinessWeek: Southern part of Summerlin showed 618 percent growth from 2000 to 2008

The southern portion of the Summerlin community in Las Vegas showed 618 percent growth to 11,595 households from 2000 to 2008, according to a recent article in BusinessWeek. Average income jumped 21 percent during that period to $91,900.

The article, "Boomtown Slowdown," looked at hundreds of communities across the nation that have seen unprecedented growth in new homes and income.

The only other community with growth of more than 600 percent was Queen Creek, Ariz., a suburb of Phoenix.

Rapid growth in these areas was fueled by cheap land, nearby job centers, easy transportation and an influx of homebuyers looking for large homes at affordable prices, BusinessWeek reported.

"The boomtowns of this decade are not booming so much in the last couple years," said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institute in Washington, D.C. " It's possible those places will come back again. A lot depends on where the economy grows and where the new knowledge centers are."