Moving to Fresno area, looking for good, family town to live in. (Bakersfield: renting, neighborhoods)

[egtriplett]

My husband has just accepted a job in California. We will be moving from Georgia. Huge move! His territory covers Madera down to Bakersfield. We know nothing about the area. We have a 3 year old and a 7 year old. We are looking for a good family town. Schools, parks, shopping, churches, family fun are what we are looking for in a town. Where we live now is about 60,000 people. We are happy with a town about that size, bigger or smaller would be fine. Atleast nearby a larger town. Any information will be greatly appreciated. We will be renting the first year and hope to keep our payment around 1000-1300 month. I have been looking at the Clovis area. It seems nice. Thoughts?

[jeffredo]

Kingsburg just south of Fresno on Hwy 99. Easy commute and a very safe town with good schools.

Kingsburg, California - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Town was settled by the Swedes and they still have a Swedish festival every year. Clovis is good too from a schools standpoint and is much more convenient for city-type shopping (its smack up against Fresno). Have cousins who live there who've gone through their schools and are now sending their kids to those same schools. Just to let you know the much lauded Clovis Unified School District does extend into the northern area of the city of Fresno - a local Realtor can help you make sure you're staying within its boundaries.

The Oakhurst/Coarsegold area of eastern Madera county is very nice (beautiful mountain location), but is about 40-45 minutes to Fresno on Hwy 41.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakhurst,_California
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coarsegold,_California

If your husband could stand the commute the air in much cleaner up there and the general feel of the community is much more safe and rural than metro Fresno. Correspondingly the schools escape many of the bigger city issues.

[FresnoFacts]

Originally Posted by egtriplett

My husband has just accepted a job in California. We will be moving from Georgia. Huge move! His territory covers Madera down to Bakersfield. We know nothing about the area. We have a 3 year old and a 7 year old. We are looking for a good family town. Schools, parks, shopping, churches, family fun are what we are looking for in a town. Where we live now is about 60,000 people. We are happy with a town about that size, bigger or smaller would be fine. Atleast nearby a larger town. Any information will be greatly appreciated. We will be renting the first year and hope to keep our payment around 1000-1300 month. I have been looking at the Clovis area. It seems nice. Thoughts?

Clovis is a nice city with good neighborhoods and schools. The newer residential areas in Clovis are north of Herndon, south of Shepherd and also east of Temperance Avenue, roughly the 93611 and 93619 zip codes.

I'd point out that Clovis and Fresno are basically one urban area, you can drive on Willow Avenue north of Fresno State and the neighborhoods on the east are Clovis, neighborhoods on the west are Fresno. So there is really no separation between Clovis and Fresno. Clovis residents shop, attend church, etc in those north Fresno areas. That means you should also look at some of the north Fresno neighborhoods.

Fresno areas north of Herndon and east of Blackstone attend Clovis Unified District schools, that is the 93720 zip code. There are also good neighborhoods and good schools in north Fresno zip codes like 93711 and 93722.

Madera to Bakersfield is a big territory, those two cities are 130 miles apart. Your husband might try to find out how his time will be spread around the area with clients. If the largest amount of time is needed to the north of the region then Clovis and north Fresno (or Kingsburg) will work well. But if there is a lot of time spent to the south around Bakersfield then you might include the area around Visalia (about 105,000 residents) in your search since that would be about the middle of his territory. But it all depends on how his time is allocated.

[Majin]

I hope you like the bible belt of California.

[BVitamin]

Originally Posted by Majin

I hope you like the bible belt of California.

OP stated that they are from Georgia, so ...

[egtriplett]

We have actually been looking into Visalia. It does seem to be more centrally located for where he will be traveling on a daily basis. Being from GA, bible belt of California sounds comforting.

[jeffredo]

Visalia is a good choice in the valley. Big enough (90,000) to have what you need, but not quite the urban center Fresno/Clovis is.

[BVitamin]

Originally Posted by egtriplett

We have actually been looking into Visalia. It does seem to be more centrally located for where he will be traveling on a daily basis. Being from GA, bible belt of California sounds comforting.

I'm in Visalia, if you have any questions, let me know and I'll try to answer. Though, I have to say, I don't go out much.

[egtriplett]

Thank you very much BVitamin. We will be flying out on the 14th to secure housing. I have heard that Linwood Elementary is a good school. Do you know much about the school district? Schools or neighborhoods to avoid?

[BVitamin]

I hear Oak Grove is a good one (in a good neighborhood too), though I don't know much about the schools around here, I've been living here for about three years and I don't have any kids.

Places to avoid is "the north side" (as that's what locals call it), look on google map for Oval Park in Visalia and you'll see the area, Houston Ave, Murray/Goshen Ave, N Ben Maddox Way, and Mooney Blvd, a rectangular area you should just avoid walking around there, okay to drive through though. It's funny because Main St (the downtown-ish area) is just a couple blocks away from the area and Main St is a pretty good area. The rest of Visalia should be okay.

If you want to live in a really affluent area, there is a gated community off the 198 E called Badger Hills outside of Visalia, though you'll have to drive to Visalia for any shopping. And there's Sequoia National Park just under an hour away for your nature-y needs.

Hope that helps some.

Added: http://school.hiwhy.com/tulare-county/ I was doing a little research, top rated elementary schools in Tulare County and I ran into that site (note: API is Academic Performance Index). Thought that might help.

Also, another thing I've heard is that a lot of the "dairy-kids" as they call it and by "it" I mean "them", usually go to Fresno for their education. Looking at the link I provided, the Fresno schools rate much higher. Fresno by the way is about 45 mins away from Visalia. FresnoFacts can probably elaborate more.