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Honestly, with a commute to Park Street and a budget up to $850K, you could consider many of the northern suburbs as well. It's an easy commute on the Orange Line from Oak Grove, Malden Center or Wellington, in to Downtown Crossing. Communities like Reading, Andover and Lynnfield are worth investigating.
You will so regret that commute if you move before you have kids. I live in one of the original towns mentioned and I know of no people here without kids or currently pregnant. In fact, most people move here when their oldest child is pre-k/kindergarten age, especially if you are a two parent working family. I think Natick might be a good compromise if you do want some space but don’t want to feel isolated being the only people without kids.
To the west, id consider Natick. To the north, I’d consider Lynnfield, Andover, Reading. If you don’t mind the tedious commute, Andover offers everything you like, and is my favorite of the towns that way.
I feel for the OP because I too love the upper MetroWest area. Beautiful, established, clean, great schools. I’m not sure it makes the most sense if you cannot sneak into Concord. Of the towns you mentioned, I’d go West Concord/Concord, Acton, Wayland, and then Sudbury. If you like that feel, you should also consider the Boxford—>Topsfield area. Stick to a town with immediate train access.
Sudbury is still a mystery to me.. Why do folks pay a premium to live there? It’s seemingly inconvenient to everything, yet is priced a good deal higher than Acton.
After living in Porter Square for a number of years, my husband and I are looking to purchase our first home. We’re interested in towns near commuter rail stations with excellent schools; well-educated, left-leaning, down-to-earth communities; and a bucolic and/or wooded feel. We’ve always fantasized about living in Concord. Taking our $800k budget into account (possibly $850k by the spring selling season) we’ve more realistically targeted West Concord and especially Acton, Sudbury, and Wayland as towns to explore. A few questions:
- I know that the great schools in these towns draw plenty of families with school-aged children, but are there many families with babies/very young children? My husband and I are in our early thirties and hope to have a child in a few years. We’d like to live somewhere where we can socialize with other new parents and draw on a good support structure for new parents (e.g. plentiful nanny share options). I know these towns may not compare to an Arlington or a J.P., but are we likely to at least find a smattering of others in our life stage?
- Should the considerably lower home values in Acton (relative not only to Concord, but even to Sudbury) give us pause? We’re drawn to the possibility of getting more home for our money while still having excellent schools and still being a quick drive to the Concord train (sounds like South Acton is a no-go with the parking lot filling up so early). I’m surprised others aren’t drawn to this, too, keeping the home values healthier, especially since Acton has better train access than Sudbury does. We drove through Acton yesterday and noticed that some sections looked more tired/unkempt than others (mostly near the train station), so we want to make sure the town isn’t on the downswing.
- Am I correct that the Superfund site in Concord/Acton is mostly cleaned up? Anything to worry about there?
- Any other towns we should consider? We’re toying with adding Natick to our list. An acquaintance of mine with a toddler is very happy there, and it sounds like it’s increasingly popular with young families, but the Pike/Route 9 traffic and smaller, mid-century homes that come to mind when I think of Natick are what we’re trying to avoid. I imagine that in Wayland, we could still get to the mall/stores quickly (and to either the Weston or Wellesley train stops if we chose the right home) while avoiding some of that congestion.
We do recognize that living in these towns would lengthen our commutes to downtown Boston considerably (Park St. area for both us, for now). However, we feel that we would be happier with a 90-minute commute where we can work remotely/relax on the train than we would be with an hour spent slogging on the bus and T (as we would need to do from most of Arlington). We’re also thinking that, if we’re going to sacrifice the amenities of living in the city, we’d like to come home to a house that we really, truly enjoy spending time in (seemingly not possible on our budget in towns closer to the city) and an environment with perks of its own (e.g. conservation lands to explore). As for multi-families, we’ve grown wary of owning a unit in one after dealing with neighbor noise/issues in our current apartment, and most condos in Cambridge/Somerville are well beyond our budget, anyway.
Thanks for your help!
If you like Porter and own a condo, have you considered staying at least until you need more space for the kids? Your condo if you own one will probably appreciate faster than the suburbs. We live near Porter with kids, we were taking it one year at a time when they were born and now we love having a family here and don't even consider leaving, but to each their own.
We looked at Concord, Wayland, Sudbury and Acton when we were moving with young kids. The main downside to Acton relative to Concord is that you have to go through the traffic back-up at the rotary to go to all points east. That alone was enough to sway our decision toward buying a small house in Concord instead of a spacious one in Acton. The schools are comparable and both communities have a lot of young children.
After living in Porter Square for a number of years, my husband and I are looking to purchase our first home. We’re interested in towns near commuter rail stations with excellent schools; well-educated, left-leaning, down-to-earth communities; and a bucolic and/or wooded feel.
We’ve always fantasized about living in Concord. Taking our $800k budget into account (possibly $850k by the spring selling season) we’ve more realistically targeted West Concord and especially Acton, Sudbury, and Wayland as towns to explore.
We do recognize that living in these towns would lengthen our commutes to downtown Boston considerably (Park St. area for both us, for now). However, we feel that we would be happier with a 90-minute commute where we can work remotely/relax on the train than we would be with an hour spent slogging on the bus and T (as we would need to do from most of Arlington). We’re also thinking that, if we’re going to sacrifice the amenities of living in the city, we’d like to come home to a house that we really, truly enjoy spending time in (seemingly not possible on our budget in towns closer to the city) and an environment with perks of its own (e.g. conservation lands to explore). As for multi-families, we’ve grown wary of owning a unit in one after dealing with neighbor noise/issues in our current apartment, and most condos in Cambridge/Somerville are well beyond our budget, anyway.
Thanks for your help!
This is a red flag to me. I have made this mistake twice. If you love the city and want to be in or near the city, you DO NOT want to move 90 minutes from the city. It is a huge drag on your lifestyle. You rarely go to the city for fun because the commute sucks the life out of you. Your city friends will not come to see you. There won't be tons of people in your same life situation -- those who are your age, married, with no kids grew up in that town and never left (perhaps except for college and maybe grad school) and they have their own friends and aren't looking to add more.
Why have you fantasized about Concord -- do you really know the town well and really want to live there? If the answer is yes, you really know Concord well, spend time there now, and would really like to live there forever, then move there. Even if you need to buy a smaller house or even a condo or other multifamily unit (despite your reservations due to your previous experience with multi family units). It's Location! Location! Location! Better to get a smaller, older place in the town you love and move up later on. An in-town move is much easier than a move to a different town. (If you have kids, they may be able to stay in the same schools they start in, etc.)
- We don't own a condo in Porter Square. We rent a one-bedroom apartment. I once thought that we would buy a condo here and not leave until any kids we had were school-aged. That is no longer a possibility on our budget. Due to some noise issues with neighbors, we've also become apprehensive of living in another multi-family building (and eager to escape the noise). Also, if we're going to own, we'd rather not have to subject every last decision (roof, exterior paint, etc.) to a vote by each owner in the building. This drove some friends of ours who owned a unit in a Cambridge three-family bananas. We currently have quite a deal on rent and pay well below market rate, and the thought of wasting $4k a month on rent for a bigger place, when we've worked so hard to save a sizable down payment, is a huge turn-off. So, we think a SFH makes the most sense.
- Because we're in a one-bedroom, we will need to live elsewhere as soon as we have a child, and I'm not keen about going through that stress while pregnant. As I mentioned in my previous post, towns such as Arlington (which are also a stretch on our budget) feel like the worst of both worlds to us -- a long commute that isn't even relaxing (bus + T), a lack of both aesthetic charm *and* very good restaurants/bars. That said, I do think Arlington could be a great community for us when/if we have young kids.
- Andover and Reading and Sharon tick a lot of boxes, for sure, but we're drawn to the Concord area in particular for three reasons:
1) We will both likely change jobs, and my husband is most likely to be in Kendall, if not downtown. There is more variability in my case, but we want to keep downtown/Cambridge/Waltham as options, which seems easiest to do from the Fitchburg line/Rte 2.
2) This area is a nice midpoint between my family in southern NH and my husband's in West Roxbury.
3) We're very emotionally attached to Cambridge/Somerville, and there is something about this area that feels like a cultural extension of our current neighborhood (probably because so many Cantabrigians have historically decamped there).
In light of all of this, I would appreciate knowing what these towns are like for families with young children. I do know of a few such families in Sudbury (e.g. friends of friends with a baby/toddler, but we haven't seen them in a while to know how they like it). My husband has acquaintances in Concord younger than us who plan to stay there and who themselves know other folks in their late 20s in Concord, but he can't seem to find out this info from them (perhaps because, without kids, they're not out and about locally as much). At any rate, it seems that there are indeed some younger people there, if not very many, so I would really appreciate solid intel from those who currently live in these towns. I'm also wondering if more first-time buyers will be pushed out that way as towns inside 128 become more and more expensive.
Also, re: Wayland: Many homes are a quick drive to the stops in Weston, others to the stops Wellesley. We don't want to limit ourselves to towns with a stop inside their own borders.
One last thing to note: we've noticed that we've been spending less time out and about with friends and more time at home with each other when we aren't working, which makes us feel as though cutting the cord on city living may not be as painful as it would have been before. We do love the bars/restaurants here and would miss them, but we're also old souls. :-)
Noticed that we've been spending less time out and about with friends and more time at home with each other when we aren't working, which makes us feel as though cutting the cord on city living may not be as painful as it would have been before. We do love the bars/restaurants here and would miss them, but we're also old souls. :-)
Thank you!!
That's an in important thing to consider, I live in Porter and some neighbors take advantage of it every day by walking, riding the T and visiting local businesses. But some never do, are car dependent, and don't really benefit as much from living here.
As far as noise - just keep in mind that places with larger lots tend to create alot of noise from lawnmowers, leafblowers, etc. Every time I visit the burbs it seems more noisy than my urban street, but we live on a quiet side street.
One last thing to note: we've noticed that we've been spending less time out and about with friends and more time at home with each other when we aren't working, which makes us feel as though cutting the cord on city living may not be as painful as it would have been before. We do love the bars/restaurants here and would miss them, but we're also old souls. :-)
I just want to say that I had similar thoughts, but I was wrong. Don't discount how much you love the city and its bars/restaurants/shops/cultural events, etc., even if you feel like more and more it is just the two of you. That almost makes it more important to have easy access to those kinds of things.
And keep in mind, children don't always arrive on the timeline you'd like them to. Sometimes they don't arrive at all. Don't base everything on the future scenario of having children to accommodate. Keep your current needs in mind, too.
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