Sydney to Boston :) (Lowell, Newton, Lawrence: middle-class, real estate, rental)

[sydneybeach]

It's possible we're relocating to Boston from Sydney Australia so of course my head is spinning with 1000 Q's. I've been on here all night reading reading reading.

Us - Family, Husband working from home but office in central Boston. No need to live in the city.
Son 9 years old, baby 1year + me.

Some questions that google doesn't seem to know...

1) Do foreigners have to pay for public schools? My son is 9years old.
2) How do we work out what grade he goes into?
3) Location, please give me the low down on areas of Boston, or direct me to another thread if this has been done 1000X. I've looked but most people seem to want to be in the city, which we don't.
Looking for a single house, garden, secure, green area but with cosmo feel (not in the sticks), close to good school, park etc. ? What area do you suggest?

4) Being a huge fan of the beach, will we survive?
5) If we want to go to the beach which are recommended?

6) Renting, we have not rented for 15 years. What's it like in the US? Are you treated like second class citizens like in Australia?

7) Lastly, where do you ski?

THANKS!!!

[ogre]

1) Do foreigners pay for public schools? You do not have to pay tuition for your son to attend school in the city or town where you live. Some towns allow children from other towns to attend their schools. In that case the parents pay tuition, but you do not pay tuition for public schools in the town where you live. This is true whether you are American or foreign, have lived in the town your whole life or have just moved there.

If you own a house, you pay property taxes, which finance local services, including schools. If you rent, the owner of the property pays property taxes, which you contribute to indirectly through your rent. Either way, this is the way in which you pay for your children's attendance at public schools, not through tuition, unless they attend school in a town other than the one where you live.

2) Which grade in school? Usually in the U.S. a nine-year-old will be in fourth grade, though it could be fifth grade if he'll have his tenth birthday very early in the academic year. After deciding on the town or city where you want to live, you may want to talk with school guidance counselors, to determine whether your son might be a year ahead of or behind the usual grade for his age, based on the curriculum he as already had compared with what subjects American children will have covered at his age.

If your son's birthday is during autumn, I would also suggest checking with school officials about which grade he would go into based on his age, assuming the curriculum he has covered so far is similar to what would have been covered in a U.S. school for a child his age. I'm not sure what the usual date is, but I believe it's during autumn that you have the milestone date where a nine-year-old who turns ten before this date goes into fifth grade, while he would go into fourth grade if he turns ten after that date.

3) Where to live. People will be better able to suggest places to live if, in addition to the description you have provided, you also include an estimate of your budget for housing, and some information about preferred maximum commuting time and whether you want ready access to public transportation. The first towns I usually think of when people say they want some of the city amenities while also having good schools and a house with a yard (American term for what you refer to as a "garden") are Brookline and Newton, but these towns have high housing costs, so it depends on your housing budget, and on further details about such factors as commuting and whether you want access to public transit.

Also, it would help to get a picture of what you're looking for if you elaborated on what you mean when you say you want a "cosmo" feel to the town where you live. To you, does this mean a lot of ethnic variety in the local population, or more that you have some urban amenities in your suburban town, like non-chain restaurants, an eclectic variety of local shops, or maybe an art-house movie theater?

4) Beach. I'm guessing that your concern has to do with the fact that the season for the beach is much shorter here than it is in Sydney. Some people here enjoy wintertime walks on the beach, but it's true that it will be a much shorter portion of the year than you are used to that you'll actually be able to go into the water. Unfortunately, I don't think it's possible to answer the question of how well you'll adjust to this, because people vary in the ease with which they feel some acclimatization to the climate here. I would suggest that it seems that people who adjust best to the winters here usually are those who get out and do things, rather than staying at home, feeling gloomy and shut in during the short days of winter.

5) Which beach? Lots of nice beaches in this area. One hint I'll give you is that the water temperatures generally tend to be significantly less cold during the summer at beaches along the southern coast of Massachusetts and Rhode Island than at most beaches anywhere north of Cape Cod, or on the north side of Cape Cod.

6) Renting. I'm not sure what you mean by being treated like second-class citizens, when you ask whether people who rent are treated this way here. Many people rent in the Boston area, and generally people are not going to think less of you if you rent rather than owning.

You might feel that you are being treated badly if you have an unscrupulous or inconsiderate landlord. Based on some bad experiences I personally have had with small-time local landlords, I would recommend dealing with real estate companies rather than landlords who act as individuals who rent just a few local properties that they own personally. Those small-time landlords never seem to forget that it's their own house that their tenants are living in, so they seem to feel free to intrude on the lives of their tenants. At least that has been my experience. Employees of the large rental companies don't usually feel the same kind of personal attachment to the properties they rent. To them it's a business, and they deal with tenants in a businesslike fashion. As long as you are a good tenant, they're fine with you, and they don't tend to set as many intrusive rules as the small-time landlords do about use of properties to which they feel personally connected (and maybe a little bit protective).

7) Skiing. Do you mean snow skiing or water skiing? I'm not sure where the lakes and ponds are where people water ski. There are some smaller snow skiing venues fairly close to Boston. One such area that seems popular is Wachusett Mountain, in central MA, maybe about an hour's drive from Boston. The bigger resorts with more serious skiing are several hours' drive from Boston, but many are close enough to make day trips for skiing if you leave early in the morning.

[xS☺B☺s]

Once the all-wise Ogre gives a proper Bostonian answer, little more need be said. I will chime in on the beach however. My fave for family fun is Hampton Beach, NH - about 45 minutes from BOS. Here's some pics.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/15145153-post49.html

[sydneybeach]

Thanks to both of you! Bostonian08, At least i know there's somewhere I can go if I feel homesick.

Ogre , Thanks for your lengthy & informative response. To clear a few things up; & hopefully get some more info.
Housing & Budget, I know it's hard to offer advise without a budget but we just don't have one yet. I'm more interested in what the areas are like. What can I expect to find on the North shore/south shore/Metro west/northwest etc? How do they differ from each other? Sweeping generalizations are fine!
EG if I was to describe areas of sydney I'd say the
Eastern Subs - is full of high density housing some very rich suburbs mixed with quite poor ones, very showy area (ie if you have money then please talk endlessly about how much you have lol), loads of good restaurants.
Innerwest - very arty, cafe & restaurant lifestyle houses are often semi-detached & high density
North Shore - is very leafy green, big old houses & wealthy.
Northern Beaches region beautiful outdoor living lifestyle, mostly houses etc etc.

That's the sort of info I need. Thanks! We like the great outdoors, cafe, restaurant lifestyle. I like to get out & walk daily pushing the pram. So walking or biking tracks would be good if available. Cosmo = cosmopolitan/sophisticated not "fast food" lifestyle.

I have read about dubious landlords so would definitely go through a real estate agent.

Snow skiing.

Thanks in advance for any further info anyone could give re the housing areas!!

[ogre]

Okay, some sweeping generalities about sections of the Boston metro area coming up.

One way to loosely divide the metro area is to distinguish the area inside rt. 128, the innermost outer belt highway, which you may see listed on maps as I-95, and areas outside of 128.

Inside 128 and south of the Charles River is most of Boston's land area. Beyond Boston's city limits, that area includes: Brookline and Newton, which I mentioned in my earlier post, both affluent inner suburbs with nice old well-maintained houses on tree-shaded streets and numbers of small neighborhood commercial districts with local small restaurants and a variety of small shops; Dedham, a very classically generic middle-class suburban town; Milton, sort of like Brookline and Newton, but not as highly affluent, and including a few somewhat faded neighborhoods, with possibly the most ethnically varied population of any Boston suburb with a predominantly suburban character.

Inside 128 and north of the river are some affluent towns with a very suburban character, one or two more basic middle-class and working class suburban towns, and a lot of densely populated small cities, very urban in character, physically very much like outlying sections of the city of Boston despite officially lying outside Boston's city limits, along with the fact that residents of these cities are likely to take some serious pride in their local communities, and emphasize that these cities have distinct local identities, and are NOT technically part of Boston. Among this expanse of outer-city character you can find just about the entire range of affluence or lack thereof that can be found in outer-urban settings.

Outside 128:

North of Boston--commonly referred to as the North Shore, that term often used to include towns that are generally toward the north of Boston, even if they are not actually located on the coast. Though all sections of the metro area have some variety in the types of communities, the North Shore may be the most varied. May be somewhat similar to your description of Sydney's eastern suburbs, in that a significant portion of this area is rather densely populated, and there is a mix of rather wealthy suburbs and some others that are more faded and working class, although, unlike your description of Sydney's eastern suburbs, any really poor areas are more likely found only in small pockets on the North Shore, especially outside of 128.

The North Shore also has a number of less densely populated suburbs with a little bit of a country feel. A few towns are quaint and touristy, with antique shops and artists' communities in some towns. Quite an eclectic area overall.

South Shore: some low-density, leafy suburbs, a few really affluent wealthy towns, some faded small cities scattered through the area, but is predominantaly characterized as down-to-earth, middle-class and some working class pure suburbia. Overall, probably the most classically middle-class (in the broad sense of the term middle-class that includes pretty much everyone who falls between the poor and the very wealthy) suburban section of the metro area.

Metro West: Overall, the most affluent section of the metro area. A few towns have a classically suburban appearance, with sidewalks and grid-pattern streets, but much of Metro West is the land of winding roads that meander through residential neighborhoods with lots of an acre or more, and plenty of fields and woodland intermixing with the residential sections.

Southwest: transitional zone between the South Shore and Metro West, with characteristics of both areas, depending on the town.

Northwest: Generally like an exurban, low-density version of Metro West. Densely populated islands are Lowell and Lawrence, two small cities with a rather urban feel, Lawrence having a reputation for being quite run down, while Lowell is an old city with a bit of a faded appearance but when compared to Lawrence having more of the variety of economic levels and neighborhoods found in most real cities. Outside of isolated nodes of population density like Lowell and Lawrence, this area has the woods and fields and winding roads of Metro West, but is less densely populated, very exurban, with clusters of residential development widely scattered among trees, meadows, ponds, and apple orchards, while much of Metro West has larger unbroken expanses of low-density residential development, with some trees and small fields mixed in.

[sydneybeach]

Thanks Ogre, that's the sort of thing I was after.