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Researching into moving my family to NYC for possible new job opportunities. I think I've sadly dropped my hopes for living in Manhattan (due to real estate and school concerns), and quickly moving on to look into Westchester and/or NJ. Here is my list of criteria:
1. Relatively shorter/manageable commute into midtown (my personal definition = 45 mins). FYI- possible job in Time Square but spouse's job location TBD so either commuting into Penn or Grand Central would be okay.
2. "GREAT-don't-need-to-ever-think-about-paying-for-private" public schools
3. $500,000-$600,000 for a 3BR or 4BR/2BA house or townhouse (don't care about exact square feet within house, don't give a care about the size of the lot, don't care about how close we are to neighbors, etc.)
4. Nice, warm community with some sort of a downtown area
Here's a short list of contenders...
NJ: Maplewood, Millburn, Glen Ridge, Verona, or Montclair
Westchester: Pelham or New Rochelle
A few questions:
- From my short list, am I barking up any wrong trees here? Do any of these NOT fit with my criteria?
- Are there any other communities in NJ or Westchester I should be adding to the short list?
- Very generally speaking, what are the realities of income and property tax situations (don't worry- I am sitting down) if we both work in Manhattan and then live in Essex County? Westchester County? An educated range of some sort would be great!
- Which amongst the NJ towns I've listed has the best and worst public school system? Westchester?
As I'm perusing through this board, it seems like you guys have some amazing insight and answers that are priceless for us out-of-towners who are trying to make a life-changing decision. Thank you in advance for your input!
a 45 minute door-to-door commute is going to be nearly impossible. the only chance for a commute under 1 hour, door-to-door, is if you live in the innermost suburbs (i.e. less than 15 miles from midtown) and your office is literally within short walking distance of penn station or grand central terminal (i.e. no need to transfer to the subway). seemingly minor things like transferring to the subway can easily add 15-25 minutes to your commute. and don't forget about the fact that you have to get to your local suburban train or bus stop in the morning; this could add another 10-20 minutes.
the only suburban towns that are within 15 miles of midtown are in northeastern nj. to get to westchester, you have to pass through the entire length of manhattan and the bronx; to get to connecticut, you have to pass through all of that, plus westchester; and to get to long island, you have to pass through queens.
so if you're dead set on keeping that commute as short as possible, my suggestion would be for you to live in nj. don't get me wrong - i'm not hating on those other areas at all. westchester, connecticut, and long island all have numerous wonderful, well-maintained towns with excellent public schools and nice downtowns. but so does north jersey, yet it's also closer (at least in the northeastern part of the state).
in other words, you can get everything you want in nj that you can get in the other areas, but you also get more house for your money in nj than westchester (housing costs in long island and nj are about the same). pound for pound, westchester is the most expensive of the nyc area's suburban subregions. taxes are also insane, too; nj's tax situation is actually slightly better off than westchester/long island, even though it's pretty bad in its own right. of course, things can vary drastically from town to town. generally speaking, towns with excellent public schools and a nice downtown tend to have exorbitant taxes.
at your budget, though, you're going to have to buy a smaller place in one of the elite towns, regardless whether you choose nj or westchester. even small 3 BR cape cods routinely sell for over $500K in the elite towns with top-notch public schools. but i see that you're willing to sacrifice square footage/acreage for the chance to buy into a high-end community, which is the right call IMO.
anyway, all of the nj towns you listed are great choices. here are some of my thoughts:
millburn is the most desirable town on your nj list for numerous reasons - top notch schools (always ranked in the top 2-3 in the state), beautiful homes, excellent rail access into the city with two train stations, and a nice, walkable downtown area. also has a wonderful upscale mall in town plus excellent gourmet food markets and fancy restaurants. the only downsides are the taxes and the potential snob factor, although the latter comes with the territory in the great majority of the wealthier nyc-area communities.
glen ridge would be my second choice from your nj list based on outstanding schools, beautiful homes, and, like millburn, a train station in town with direct rail access into midtown. taxes are brutal and there's no downtown to speak of, as the entire town is basically centered along a single main road (ridgewood ave) with side streets that run 2-3 blocks in either direction. IMO the lack of a downtown is no big deal, though, because depending where your potential house is located, you're still close to one of the downtowns in montclair (to the west) or bloomfield (to the east), which are both filled with a variety of nice shops and restaurants.
based purely on schools, verona would be my third choice from your list. although verona is generally considered to be an upper middle class town, it definitely has a greater number of middle class residents and decent but unremarkable houses compared with millburn or glen ridge. IMO this is a plus, since the town has far less of a snob factor. also, the schools are well-regarded in verona, but not quite on the level the other two towns; i'd consider it a lower 1st tier/upper 2nd tier school system rather than upper 1st tier system like millburn/glen ridge. based on the very good-but-not-super-duper-elite school system and the higher inventory of modest homes, you'll have an easier time finding a house in your budget in this town. the only downside, really, is that there's no train station; you'd have to go to one of the neighboring towns for rail service, or else take the bus to get to the city. also, verona's downtown cannot compare with the other towns on your list.
maplewood would be my fourth choice - a close fourth, or perhaps a tie for third with verona. maplewood is a lovely town with beautiful homes, tree-lined streets, high taxes, and an excellent downtown with a train station that brings you directly into midtown. its overall income level is not as high as the previous three towns, but IMO it has a larger population of wealthy-to-very wealthy residents than verona, which is more consistently middle-to-upper middle class. on the flip side, maplewood has more lower middle class residents than verona, too. this income disparity has a direct effect on schools, as i'll discuss below.
while the elementary schools in maplewood are supposed to be good-to-very good, the high school has an "ok" rather than "excellent" ranking. from what i understand, though, this is very misleading. i know a number of people who attended the local h.s. and said they were very happy with their experience and that the school offers a great education with a number of good programs.
according to them, the reason for the decent-but-not-spectacular school ranking is that there is a socioeconomic divide in town between the white students (who overwhelmingly tend to be affluent and almost universally come from households with well-educated parents that greatly prioritize high academic achievement) vs. the large african-american minority, which is more of a mixed bag (some of the kids come from middle or upper middle income households which place a high value on education, while others are more working class and/or not as academically focused). in other words, the so-so ranking is purely indicative of a fairly sizable minority of students who don't score as well on standardized tests and thus bring down the school's overall scores (which are used to calculate school rankings) rather than the quality of the education, which is supposed to be very good, especially if your child is enrolled in honors/AP classes.
everyone i've met who lives in maplewood with school-age chidren (along with neighboring south orange, which shares the high school) talks about the aforementioned school ranking issues when deciding whether to send their kids to public or private high school. maplewood is somewhat of an anomaly among affluent suburban communities in that a full 1/3 of the population is af-am and the high school is unusually diverse; by contrast, most of the elite nyc-area towns are overwhelmingly white or white/asian. to me, the racial diversity is one of the town's major assets, but the socioeconomic diversity does cause resentment among some residents and in the high school.
the bottom line is this, though: the top students at the local high school always get into top-notch universities. i don't know how students in the middle of the pack fare, though.
another thing: maplewood (and south orange) share a border with two of the roughest municipalities in the state (irvington and newark), but the police officers of the two affluent towns patrol their eastern borders extremely vigilantly. so from what i understand, crime spillover from the adjacent urban area is not an issue at all.
finally, montclair would be my last pick of the nj towns you listed solely because the local high school is merely ok rather than excellent. i have heard that many of the elementary schools, especially in the more affluent parts of town, are quite good. but i know many kids from montclair who ended up going to private school once they reached h.s. because their parents did not think much of montclair h.s.
overall, though, it's a wonderful town. it has amazing rail access to the city, with six stations in town and a seventh on the montclair/little falls border. montclair has several lively commercial business districts with numerous upscale shops and one of the state's top dining scenes. it also has a large af-am population and, like maplewood and south orange, is viewed as much more progressive and "hip" compared with the typical white-bread suburb. for what it's worth, a number of ny times writers (along with broadway theater performers and other creative types) choose to live in montclair and maplewood due to the liberal, progressive vibe in these towns.
you also might want to consider some other towns which offer nice, walkable downtowns, top-notch public schools, commuter rail service, attractive homes that will retain their value over the long haul, and a reasonable commute to midtown (not 45 minutes, but decent nonetheless). some of these towns include summit, westfield, ridgewood, glen rock, chatham, ho-ho-kus, allendale, ramsey, woodcliff lake, montvale, hillsdale, berkeley heights, new providence, etc. other towns which are very solid all-around, but perhaps a half notch below the aforementioned (academically speaking), include oradell, river edge, westwood, park ridge, cranford, metuchen, scotch plains, montville, wayne, etc.
if you're willing to take the bus instead of the train (or drive to a neighboring community's rail station), that opens up a lot more possibilities, including tenafly, cresskill, demarest, closter, haworth, norwood, harrington park, old tappan, river vale, wyckoff, franklin lakes, livingston, north caldwell, springfield, leonia, etc.
and there are plenty of other elite towns that are a bit further out such as mountain lakes, basking ridge, bernardsville, watchung, warren, etc, but then you'll have a longer commute. still, there are no shortage of quality towns in the state (and the region as a whole), so you should explore all options.
Check out Union counties too. Westfield, Summit, Cranford, New Providence and Berkeley Heights are have great public school system. If you price range is 500k to 600k, then you will find plenty of houses within that range.
If you don't mind driving to Newark Penn, consider Livingston (east side of the town). It takes about 15 minutes to drive to Newark Penn.
how is the town search going? do you have any further info to share that can help the posters here narrow down the search for you (e.g. updated info on the specific job location)? do you have any other questions about certain towns in particular? and what have you been hearing from the westchester posters about this topic?
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