From Wyoming to Pennsylvania (Norristown, Springfield: house, safe area, school district)

[dcschoenwolf]

Hello all! Our little family is looking to move from Casper, Wyoming to somewhere near Philly. We are having a hard time finding a place that will meet our needs. We have been advised to not live in Philly but to instead look for a suburb. I work as a paralegal and my fiance workings as a nurse. We are looking for a town that has great pay for the nursing field as I only work part time due to our little one having special needs. So things that are important for us include great nursing pay, reasonable housing expenses, great schools, and therapy choices (for developmental delays such as physical, occupational and speech therapy). Other important things are safe neighborhoods and family oriented communities. We love the outdoors, hunting, hiking, camping. The fiance would love to live somewhere where he could hunt pheasants. I'd enjoy a smaller/med sized community that has lots of activities and possibly a quaint downtown. If anyone could point us in some sort of direction it would be greatly appreciated! We have family in Delaware and Maryland so we are familiar with the environment and weather back east.

[cpomp]

Budget???

[dcschoenwolf]

$200,000 to $250,000 for housing. As I understand it this will probably put us an hour outside of Philly.

[stuckinsj]

jersey you could get closer for less.

[mls128]

Certainly not the only place but Springfield pa comes to mind. Only thing it doesn't really have you
re looking for is a downtown. But, you could get a nice house within your budget there. Lots of families and community involvement, safe area. It's about a half hour from center city. Schools aren't the BEST in the area, but are definitely solid and above average.

[cfm328]

Mysister in law is from Casper! I am in Swarthmore and the 200-250K is a hardprice point to enter here. But it does have the quaint town. But that said thegreat school district is Wallingford Swarthmore and it includes WallingfordSwarthmore and Rutledge. You can find housing in Wallingford and Rutledge atthese prices. Media also has good schools and a great town center. Springfieldis great but as said above no real town center. Ridley Creek State park isclose and they definitely have deer hunting, not sure what else you can hunt.

[Avalon08]

Wow, that's a lot of diverse criteria! Nursing pay would probably be highest in the city hospitals. I just checked Ridley Creek State Park as I used to live near there and I had no idea they allowed hunting. Anyway, it's deer hunting; however, there are other parks in the 'burbs that allow pheasant hunting -- Evansburg, Marsh Creek, Nockamixon. Maybe you could look in the area north/east of Norristown -- Lansdale, Skippack, Collegeville. There is some beautiful open space in these areas and Evansburg is close-by. They are about 45 mins. outside the city. Good luck to you!

[PhillyPhan95]

Phoenixville, perhaps. It has a hospital, a nice downtown, good schools, and if you're staying south of the Schuylkill, it's really the last urban center before you hit more rural areas. It's about 45 minutes from downtown Philly. I don't hunt so I'm not 100% sure what that is like in the area, but I have friends that are very into it and they seem to do it nearby. To the north is Collegeville, which is typical suburban living with big roads, large shopping centers and big business campuses. To the east is Valley Forge/King of Prussia, which is nice to be close to. There's good outdoor activities in the park and lots of shopping near the mall. Going south one hits the Mainline, and west is rural areas heading towards Amish country. I think it's worth a look for you.