Four cities rose to the top: New York, Dallas, Austin or Atlanta.

Those were the considerations for Marlon Williams and his fiancée, Megan Thomas. They were in a long-distance relationship — he in Miami Beach and she in Los Angeles — and ready to move in together and build a family. Williams, a partner at Starter Capital, also had more entrepreneurial itches he wanted to scratch.

The pair ultimately settled in May on a 6-bed, 7-bath, 7,800-square-foot home on a private golf course in Roswell, which Williams describes as having a “super-duper cool mix of city and calmness.” He also launched the Atlanta Blockchain Center, a four-employee operation of locally sourced crypto lovers, in Buckhead, with hopes of mimicking the Switchyards model both in the suburbs — such as Roswell or Alpharetta — or possibly in South Atlanta.