Investing in properties in Boca Raton gives you a win-win scenario in every sense of the phrase. The city, which lies just on the Palm Beach side of the Broward County line in south Florida, is both a popular resort and a delightful place to call home. Poised along the pristine white sand beaches of the Atlantic coast, it enjoys the year-round temperate weather of the coastal lowlands and has been an extremely popular resort for some time with good reason.

Properties in Boca Raton: What the Name Means

Boca Raton (elevation 16 feet) encompasses just over 27 square miles directly on the coast. The land encircles an ocean inlet, for which the city is named, that has given rise to a number of tall tales. In question is the meaning of the name Boca Raton. One popular explanation had it that the translation was very simply rat's mouth. No matter what way you look at it, the story is as colorful as properties in Boca Raton are a sound investment.

While the word boca does indeed mean mouth in Spanish, the word raton--especially in old Spanish--was most often used in reference to a cowardly thief. A more logical translation, the city hastens to explain, might thus be thieves' inlet. Unfortunately, this notion doesn't stand up well. The inlet around which properties in Boca Raton lie wasn't deep enough for any kind of ship until it was dredged in the 1930. The most sensible and plausible explanation, which the city of Boca Raton understandably espouses, has to do with geology.

The term boca ratones, again in old Spanish, referred to a geological formation for an inlet whose bottom was covered in either coral or jagged rock. Farther south, in Miami's Biscayne Bay, is such a formation. A map maker in the early 19th century copying an old Miami map is said to have gotten confused while labeling his map.