Northeast of DC (Silver Spring, College Park, Greenbelt: crime, houses, neighborhoods)

[badchad]

I'm looking to move outside of the DC area in MD. Ideally, I would be east of Silver Spring (I will be working off New Hampshire Ave close to the 495/95 split).

I have a max budget of 400k (but would be happy going 350-375 ish).

I'm tempted to look at areas like Hillandale, White Oak, or maybe Laurel. However I'm just picking these places off the map and have no idea what their characteristics are.

I want a single family home, schools are unimportant as I don't have kids. My primary concern is safety, I'd like a place that's very safe and pretty quiet (think Beaver Cleaver). It would be nice though to have some activities and outlets to socialize hang out etc as I am only 30.

Any ideas to get me started? I'm entirely unfamiliar with the area.

[Alicia Bradley]

Oh man, this is the same position I was in a few years ago. East of Silver Spring is ghetto, unfortunately, except for a few pockets in College Park.

[cpterp]

Laurel is really nice (my mom used to have a practice there), but about 15-20min out (from the I-495/I-95 split) depending on traffic conditions and route.

Closer in I tend to disagree with Alicia slightly. EOSS is not all "ghetto." I used to commute to Takoma Park and it's really nice (near to Silver Spring anyway). Berwyn Heights, Greenbelt, University Park, College Park are mostly livable. I would stay away from Langley Park and Hyattsville though, which seem to be the illegal immgrant hub for Maryland.

[beth121]

Takoma Park near Old Town is nice and relatively safe. Some pockets of Hyattsville are very nice and in your price range. However, in general, east of Silver Spring is hardly "Beaver Cleaver" area. I would certainly recommend visiting to get a feel for the neighborhoods and surrounding areas.

Keep in mind the traffic in the NH Ave/495 area is horrendous. The commute to Laurel would get old very fast.

[Bigbluelandrover]

Alicia---Bull.
There are some very nice quiet streets in Hillandale.(the homes are over 400 though) Also go further north on New Hamshire past Randolph and there's Colesville and Cloverly. -Schools out that way are better and even with no kids it is always best to buy near better schools. (Private schools are out that way too) There are very quiet streets out there with nice homes. Please get a realtor. I live near the area not far from FDA and have seen a lot of streets out that way.

[scrapper105]

You may want to take a look at my town, University Park, in Prince George's County. University Park is an incorporated town within P.G. County with our own town government, police force, sanitation department, etc. Very similar in look and feel to the very expensive area of Chevy Chase, Maryland but with houses that are a little smaller and a LOT more affordable. Metro station is with a mile, and we have a town shuttle that runs throughout the town and to the metro every morning and evening. Many people assume that since University Park is in Prince George's County that it is unsafe, but that is UNTRUE ! I could go on and on - but check out our town website [url="http://www.upmd.org"]www.upmd.org[/URL]

And also, Hyattsville is really an incorporated city with specific political/geographic boundaries. Many people call random areas of PG County (that aren't incorporated into a town) Hyattsville when they are nowhere close to Hyattsville. So, it's better to talk about neighborhoods when you're talking about Hyattsville. The Hyattsville historic district is really nice.

In all of these areas (and frankly anywhere in the DC metro region) you're going to have petty crime, like car break-ins. So I wouldn't take anybody's word for it that a particular area is safe or unsafe. Look at the specifics of the crime statistics.