Surrounding Cleveland Cities... Where to LIVE??? (Columbus, Parma: apartments, foreclosure, renting)

[brocdc]

My family and I are looking to move out of south Florida. Looking for a nice family filled area with good schools. Have 2 young children. I heard good things about the west side of cleveland. My wife does have family in Rocky River, but we are looking at all areas. East side west side... Heard things about Avon/Avon Lake. Affordable new home construction, but then we heard about the Cancer scare. Any bit of information will help. It is crunch time and we need to make a decision fast. Thanks for you help!

[gtsurfer05]

Really any west side suburb is a good bet if you want a safe decent community, the west has not suffered as much as the east side has in regards to decay. As for the best schools on the west side, there are a few, Bay Village, Westlake, Rocky River, Strongsville, North Royalton, Independence, Valley View and Brecksville-Broadview Hts. The east side also has good schools too, I'd say Solon would be one of the best in the county, there is also Orange Schools, and Shaker Heights. You typically want to stay away from the inner ring suburbs on the east side(exception being Shaker, and some will say Cleveland Heights too, however there you should send your kids to a private high school). Inner ring on the west side are decent communities, Brooklyn is a nice small city, Parma is big and goes from the smaller houses up in the north of the city, to more typically bigger suburban houses in the south, Seven Hills is within the Parma school district and has decent housing stock however I find the city quite bland and Parma schools are just normal even Normandy which is considered the "rich" school by kids in the other 2 high schools. Lakewood is a nice community on the lake, with also decent schools, there is alot of renting options, along with houses from normal to big on the lake.

[Clevelander17]

The west side, to me, is more cookie cutter in appearance and feel (outside of Lakewood and maybe one or two others, but those are also the areas that have suffered most decay in recent years, too). The east side has much more character and for the most part much better public schools at the top (well and private schools for that matter, too).

Specifically, from the east side, I would recommend Solon area, Orange area, Beachwood, Shaker Heights, Chagrin Falls, and Aurora.

[BelieveInCleve]

Clevelander17 is right on this one. All suburbs on each side of the city are pretty nice, but the ones closer in on the Eastside have the most decay but also have the most character. The westside suburbs seemed newer to me and not as wealthy as some of them on the eastside. Whichever area you chose you should be happy with.

However the southern Suburbs and the western suburbs get a lot less snow than some of the far eastside suburbs, its like 40-55 inches on the westside and southside is a little bit less, the Eastside is mainly 65-85 inches but some of the farther eastside suburbs can get up to 105" of snow, if that matters.

[Clevelander17]

Originally Posted by Cle440

Clevelander17 is right on this one. All suburbs on each side of the city are pretty nice, but the ones closer in on the Eastside have the most decay but also have the most character. The westside suburbs seemed newer to me and not as wealthy as some of them on the eastside. Whichever area you chose you should be happy with.

The only area suburbs that I try to avoid are on the east side. I'm talking about mainly East Cleveland, Warrensville Heights, and to a lesser extent Euclid and Maple Heights and parts of the Bedford area. I think Lakewood (west side) and Cleveland Heights (east side) are about even in the amount of "decay" that they've seen, just in different ways. They're still livable, although I wouldn't buy a home in either unless I had a lot of money, were planning on staying a while, and/or didn't have kids.

Personally if I were an outsider looking to live in the Cleveland suburbs, I wouldn't limit myself to one side of the town or the other. Both sides have very nice areas and both sides have areas that I'd avoid (for different reasons). If you give us a little detail about what you're looking for, maybe mention where you're planning on working, etc., maybe we can help a little more.

From re-reading your post I'd say that Rocky River is a very nice place to live and taking it a step further, all of those west shore communities (Rocky River, Bay, Westlake, Avon Lake, Avon) are pleasant, safe, and have good schools.

[APB52]

Hi - we are looking to relo for job in Brooklyn. Schools (10th and 5th grades) are a priority with easy commute to Brooklyn. Looking for 4 bdrm in good family community. Larger lot and 3 car garage preferred. We could also rent/lease with option to buy after looking if there are many choices. Are there foreclosure properties? Would also consider something near lakes or country setting as long as commute was still decent. How are the winters?

[WeSoHood]

Originally Posted by Clevelander17

The west side, to me, is more cookie cutter in appearance and feel (outside of Lakewood and maybe one or two others, but those are also the areas that have suffered most decay in recent years, too). The east side has much more character and for the most part much better public schools at the top (well and private schools for that matter, too).

Specifically, from the east side, I would recommend Solon area, Orange area, Beachwood, Shaker Heights, Chagrin Falls, and Aurora.

Completely untrue. I say the west side suburbs have much more character. Lakewood, Rocky River, Fairview, (not a suburb) West Park, Berea, etc have a TON of character. Cookie cutter type homes? Where? Oh yea... you're talking about Beachwood. I mean sure, Avon and Avon Lake type areas do, but don't say Lakewood strictly has character. East side character = Cleveland Heights and Shaker to me. I don't understand how some of the older suburbs with older fashion homes have less character than your east side counter parts like Aurora, Solon, Beachwood have a plethora of cookie cutters.

[BelieveInCleve]

Well, I think the poster meant the newer areas. If you go to westlake and around that area and anywhere west of there its pretty much all cookie-cutter homes in the suburbs. Im not saying its not nice because it is very nice, but it is kind of boring because all the homes look the same. You can see this a lot in North Ridgeville, Avon Lake, Westlake, Strongsville, and some other areas.

Cleveland has a lot better suburbs than most other metro areas as far as character goes though. Mostly because Clevelands suburbs tend to be older, but yes there are cookie-cutter areas but its less than most other major cities.

[Clevelander17]

Originally Posted by WeSoHood

Completely untrue. I say the west side suburbs have much more character. Lakewood, Rocky River, Fairview, (not a suburb) West Park, Berea, etc have a TON of character. Cookie cutter type homes? Where? Oh yea... you're talking about Beachwood. I mean sure, Avon and Avon Lake type areas do, but don't say Lakewood strictly has character. East side character = Cleveland Heights and Shaker to me. I don't understand how some of the older suburbs with older fashion homes have less character than your east side counter parts like Aurora, Solon, Beachwood have a plethora of cookie cutters.

Um, Westlake, Strongsville, North Olmsted, Bay Village, Avon, Avon Lake. All nice areas, but all very cookie cutter.

I'll split you the difference and say that regardless of the side of town, the inner-ring suburbs tend to have much more character than their outer-ring counterparts. The only exceptions would be Gates Mills and Chagrin Falls, on the east side, which as far as I know, don't have any counterparts on the west side. Tons of character in those small, New England-like towns.

I'm not going to mention places like Euclid, East Cleveland, Collinwood, or Glenville, because I wouldn't recommend living in any of those places, but all of them do have a lot of character.

[WeSoHood]

Originally Posted by Clevelander17

Um, Westlake, Strongsville, North Olmsted, Bay Village, Avon, Avon Lake. All nice areas, but all very cookie cutter.

I'll split you the difference and say that regardless of the side of town, the inner-ring suburbs tend to have much more character than their outer-ring counterparts. The only exceptions would be Gates Mills and Chagrin Falls, on the east side, which as far as I know, don't have any counterparts on the west side. Tons of character in those small, New England-like towns.

I'm not going to mention places like Euclid, East Cleveland, Collinwood, or Glenville, because I wouldn't recommend living in any of those places, but all of them do have a lot of character.

Avon, Avon Lake, parts of Westlake, and Strongsville are cookie cutter. North Olmsted has a lot of apartments and condos and I can't understand anything about it being cookie cutter. When I hear cookie cutter I picture Beachwood or some other ritzy suburb with newly built homes. Not old suburbs with homes from the early 1900s with character. To me Chagrin Falls is nice, old homes, but relatively rural area. I consider anything with under 3,000 people per square mile to be rural. Surely, that isn't correct but I can't help but get that feel coming from my "westside cookie cutter" LOL area.

But yeah, I agree with you. I feel most of the newly developed suburbs are cookie cutter in their feel. They still pale in comparison to say Columbus suburbs - which are almost all entirely cookie cutteresque.