Relocating to Northern VA from SF (Arlington, Alexandria: condos, houses, neighborhoods)

[KOrson]

My husband and I are (hopefully) planning on relocating from San Francisco to Northern Virginia within the next year. We have both lived in Virginia before [Front Royal to be specific] but we are not sure which neighborhoods are best more towards the DC Area. I will be (hopefully) getting an internship and then a job with the EPA and my husband is a pastry chef so we need to be fairly close enough to the DC area that we would avoid 2+ hour commutes. We are thinking that Northern VA will be the place to buy our first house. We really have not been searching that much for listings on the internet but we're trying to stay under $500k, a place with more trees and greenery than other houses and shopping centers, etc. We do not have any children so schools are not important yet.

Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.

[leighland]

Originally Posted by KOrson

My husband and I are (hopefully) planning on relocating from San Francisco to Northern Virginia within the next year. We have both lived in Virginia before [Front Royal to be specific] but we are not sure which neighborhoods are best more towards the DC Area. I will be (hopefully) getting an internship and then a job with the EPA and my husband is a pastry chef so we need to be fairly close enough to the DC area that we would avoid 2+ hour commutes. We are thinking that Northern VA will be the place to buy our first house. We really have not been searching that much for listings on the internet but we're trying to stay under $500k, a place with more trees and greenery than other houses and shopping centers, etc. We do not have any children so schools are not important yet.

Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.

For a bit less than 500K, you could get a fun condo in Arlington or Old Town Alexandria. Old Town would have the more mature (not retiree) nightlife while Arlington, at least near the Metro stops where the condos are, are more the 20-something crowd.
Spend some time on the realty sites like Long and Foster. Good Luck!

[Alexys]

Good luck moving to Northern Virginia. I lived in Springfield, VA, Fairfax county and truely loved it. You can read about some of my experiences at

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Alexys