Hingham (Boston, Weymouth, Shrewsbury: housing, rent, work)

[threekidsanddog]

It turns out we may be moving to the Boston area from out of state. I will be working near the South Station and was wondering what people thought of Hingham? We have 3 kids and it seems like a nice family oriented town.

[brightdoglover]

Beautiful historic old town. New England picture perfect. Pricey.

[findingmesomeday]

Nightmare commute into Boston.

[haberstroh]

Very nice, especially with kids....good schools as well! But we found it too expensive and a lot of houses had water problems (wet basements, flooding, high water table). As stated before: bad commute.

[foozman]

I am from Hingham and have lived here most of my life. It is very expensive as others have indicated, but I think that you really get what you pay for. The town has its issues, but not financial ones, which ultimately benefits its residents..It is picturesque and friendly. The schools are great, even though I did not have the easiest time with them, I know they have improved quite a bit in recent years with the retirement of many of the teachers that I suffered under. The downtown is second to none in Massachusetts in my opinion, with stores and walk to the ocean area by the water that is a large park to hang out in and have fun...If you are a boater or enjoy views it is just amazing with worlds end and alot of preservation land keeping the town country feeling. I really cant say enough..It is unfortunate that it is soo expensive and out of reach of the average person, from which the town became great..The commute is not a nightmare if you dont regularly drive into Boston. Just use the public transit options and you will enjoy the proximity to everything. I have had 4 homes in different communities and I can tell you that Hingham is a great place to invest your housing dollar. People have and will always want to be here. Hope this helps!

[Boomerang]

If you move to Hingham, just remember: don't put colored lights outside your house at Christmastime! ;-> There was something in the papers a few years ago about someone who moved there being strongly encouraged to change to white lights like everybody else.
...Anyone remember the details?

[happywifey]

Hingham is really nice. We just moved to Weymouth - next to Hingham and probably considered lower class compared to Hingham, but we're average Joes and love it down here! If my husband was a lawyer than we probably would be living in Hingham. He is not though

[threekidsanddog]

Thanks that is a big help. I heard the ferry or the new train line were convenient. The comment about the water table is very interesting and seems to make a lot of sense to me. I certainly enjoy multi-colored lights so that might keep me away! Thanks for all of the comments!

[Patapsco]

hi -

I just got home from a househunting trip up there. My husband will be working in the financial district, so is also going to S. Station.

We are all about Hingham, but I don't see how we can afford it. I think the people who are saying the commute is a nightmare haven't considered the new train (something like 35 minutes to S. Station) and the ferry, which is I think 30 minutes.

They have excellent schools, lots for families/kids, and the library is,compared to every other town we looked in, incredible. I put the libraries on my tour b/c you can tell a lot about the town, their funding, their priorities for their funding, education, etc. etc. by how the library is. Collection, age of collection, programming, etc. etc. etc.

The only other library that came even close was Duxbury... but it too is a hike.(and expensive) We LOVE the water (being sailors) and the train from Kingston is comparable (I think 6 minutes longer) than it is from, oh, I'm drawing a blank here, I think it's Westboro & Franklin. Grafton's I think 2 minutes longer.

It cracked us up, b/c the realtor in Duxbury actually apologized for including a house that was *gasp* on "only" a half acre!!! Just try and afford anything on a half acre close in! But I digress.

The downside to Hingham is the rediculously out of control housing costs. I know, I know, supply & demand, I've got it. But I'm seriously starting to think even in this so-called buyer's market we're not going to be able to get anything for less than $800 that doesn't need renovating. Not "updating", not just a shiny new fridge and some wallpaper, but flat out RENOVATING.

Our range is 550-650, could *maybe* stretch to 700 if we had to (there goes any furniture, upgrading, etc.). In Franklin that buys you a McMansion (if that's your thing) and in Hingham, well, go to realtor.com .

We saw aout 35 houses in 3 days in Hingham, Duxbury, North/South/West/Northboro, Holliston, Hopkinton, Shrewsbury, and I think I'm forgetting somewhere, but the only house we saw that we both (key word BOTH!) felt that "this is the house!!" feeling was in Northboro for $729...well beyond our range.

There are plenty of metrowest houses in our range, just kind of disappointed that we can't pick up our house here and move it to MA.

Sorry for all the negativity, I'm just bummed.

On the POSITIVE side, everyone we encountered was incredibly friendly, nice, helpful, it was AMAZING. There are some stories there for another post. I don't know what they're talking about with these unfriendly newenglander posts.

Best of luck! Hope I haven't bummed you out too much.

[findingmesomeday]

Patapsco: Check out Medfield. You should be able to find a house with that budget.

They've got a great library, so it must mean something!