Cape Elizabeth or Falmouth (Portland, Scarborough: house prices, schools, salaries)

[Caper04107]

Hello from Cape!

As far as neighborhoods go, in Cape there isn't really a "neighborhood" walkable to Two Lights. I guess the Two Lights Terrace and Lighthouse Point Road area is one, but not a big neighborhood. In the north end of town, Sherwood Forest is right across the street from Fort Williams (Portland Head Light) where a lot of soccer and baseball games are held. Also, Oakhurst, Cape Cottage Woods, Stonybrook and Mountain View Park are all walkable to the Fort. And Oakhurst has a private neighborhood beach (The older houses have beach access. Check before you buy.)

I can tell you from personal experience that Oakhurst, Stonybrook, and Mountain View Park are loaded with kids of all ages (my wife chose this neighborhood based on the "number of kids and swingsets" method) and we could not be more pleased) It's the kind of neighborhood where you can let your kids out the door to play, and they are all over the neighborhood with their friends, with no worries. In the woods, skating on the pond, biking, and on and on.

If you want newer houses, check out Cross Hill, Stonegate, Elizabeth Farms or Cranbrook. Larger lots in Cranbrook, and you can walk to Pond Cove on Shore Road.

Broad Cove has a lot of kids, too. Especially in the Hunts Point Road section, but Broad Cove Road itself can be busy. You're going to find the property taxes here are dramatically cheaper than on LI.

In yesterday's Portland Press Herald (The "Newsday" of Maine) www.pressherald.com, there was an article on high school drouput rates in Maine. The state average for HS dropouts is 2.70%. Falmouth is 1.01%. Cape Elizabeth is 0.34%. I believe the percentage of HS students going on to college from Cape is something like 93%.

Yes, Cape has a phenominal Community Services program with an amazing catalogue of activities to choose from (Over 600 programs for kids and family). You should try to get a copy of the catalogue. Call 207-799-2868 and ask for Sue Weatherbie. Or click on the Community Services link on the Cape website FMI.

There is an Extended program at the Community Services buidling (newly acquired and renovated by the town) for after school care. Peggy who runs the after school care program is a sweetheart.

Keep those questions coming!

Good Luck.

[ALSM]

Thanks to reader from Cape.
couple more questions -
How is it for the kids to play soccer, etc. so close to the ocean. Isn't it extremely windy? Also, where is the ice skating pond - is it near Fort Williams park? I saw a nice house listed in Shore Acres - do you know where Shore Acres is?

Those neighborhoods you mentioned sound great - exactly what we're looking for (on Long Island kids don't really get to do that anymore - they can maybe play in their own back yards but not much further without worrying about them)

Off topic a little - How is the economy up there? My husband is very concerned about being able to make a decent living up there (he's in sales and I'm a software developer). He's going to start looking shortly and then I guess we'll get a feel for the job market.

Thanks again.

[Caper04107]

Hello, again.

I don't find it too windy at the Fort. When you are there watching your kids play a ball game and at the same time watch the ships go by in Casco Bay and look at the islands and the lighthouse, you realize what an unprecedented lifestyle you are giving your kids. It's amazing. I never get tired of it!

There is a small skating pond right in my neighborhood, and another one at Fort Williams, next to the tennis courts. My kids like to bike down to the Fort with their friends to go skating.

I do know about Shore Acres. We have several friends who live there. It's a mix of mostly 1950s and 1960s houses. Some are on the water ($$), some are much more modest. There is a private, mostly rocky beach for the neighborhood. Lots of original owners there, but the houses are turning over and being renovated by younger families. It's mid-Cape, off Old Ocean House Road. Halfway between Town and the State Park (Two Lights). Which house did you see in Shore Acres, I'm curious. What "vintage" neighborhood are you looking for? 1900's, 1920's,1960's,1980's, new?

I'll tell you that in my neighborhood, there's hardly ever anything for sale. So lots of times houses sell by word of mouth. We get letters from people asking us to keep them in mind if we ever decide to sell. That's how 2 houses sold in my neighborhood this year. We bought our house "through the grapevine", thankfully. Otherwise, we would have found out too late that it was coming available.

Hard to tell on the economy, as I'm not out there in the job market! We're in the process of hiring for our business, which is very strong. Lots of jobs in Medicine/healthcare and legal. Or maybe it's just that many of the people we know are in those fields! (but not us). If you're coming to Maine, Portland is without a doubt where you want to be. It's by far the strongest job market. I do know a lot of people who choose to live here (in Cape) for the quality of life, whose jobs are actually based in Boston or New York or further. They telecommute or go into the city once a week. i have a neighbor who goes into Boston every day. And I drive 45 mins to work, which locals consider a long way. Of course, you know that 45 mins might get you from Jericho Turnpike to Round Swamp Road on the LIE!

If you have more q's, let me know. If you would like to email directly, also thats fine........you'll be amazed at how friendly Mainers are.

[ALSM]

Hi again - thanks for the info.
The house I saw in Shore Acres was on realtor.com for 419,500.
We are looking for a house on the newer side, I guess 1980's to current, however neighborhood is more important and if we saw an older house and loved the neighborhood we would consider it (we like the idea of the lower taxes on the older homes also). I really think we're leaning towards renting for 6 - 12 months initially so that we can get more familiar with the neighborhoods first. Although we are not looking forward to packing up and moving twice.

We're hopefully going to take a trip up there in March sometime to look around both towns again and hopefully come to some decision about which town we will go with. I would also like to tour the elementary schools of each town to get an idea of what they're like.

Thanks so much for all your helpful insight.

[riley49]

ALSM - I just came across this thread and am very interested how things are progressing with your move. My husband and I plan to do the very same thing next year and our questions and concerns are almost identical to yours. We're even planning to rent at first so we can take our time picking out a house. But we want to make sure we rent in the school district my kids will go to when we buy our house. Cape Elizabeth and Falmouth both sound great. Our third contender so far (based on very limited information) is Yarmouth. Have you heard anything about that town? Anyway, I wish you well and would love to hear what is going on - where you chose to live, based on what information, and if you are happy with your choices. Thanks!

[foster823]

Hello. I, too, just came across this thread -- it's as though I had written the questions. My family with young kids (1 and 3) are planning our move for 2 years from now, focusing on the Portland suburbs. We've been targeting Falmouth, Yarmouth, Cape Elizabeth and Cumberland. Two questions: (1) what about Portland proper? I've seen some lovely houses in the Deering neighborhood. (2) what about some slightly inland towns, such as Gorham? I guess I have a third question also. We're moving from Chicago's north shore and want to avoid communities with a snooty, materialistic, everyone's-delightfully-rich type of attitude. We're looking for very down-to-earth, natural, outdoorsy environment where folks are smart and compassionate and real. Thoughts?

[MRVphotog]

My place is in Cumberland, the kids go/went to Greely.

Falmouth is a strange place. The joke is it "fakes a village". I mean the Post Office is in Shaws, no real village center. Just built a beautiful HS, has some very nice neighborhoods but then you have the shopping along Rt 1, more shopping center than town. The hockey rink is nice, especially the outside skating. Pretty nice town landing.

If you want your kids to grow up to be soccer players than Falmouth with coach Dave Halligan is the place to be.

Real estate is pretty high priced but assume prices are abit pricier in Cape. Real estate prices are going down abit. Cape has some great things too. We go down to Cape to pick strawberries and Two Lights SP and Portland HL are awesome.

Cumberland is very sleepy...that's why we like it. The town has purchased land/farms as a buffer from the subdivision sprawl from Falmouth moving up Rt 9. The schools are good. Personally not into the intense school data anaylsis but all 3 schools, HS, brand new MS and Elementary school are bunched together which is good. The town also owns and operates a nice golf course and a x-c trail system with snowmaking.

[keith07]

I'm wondering if the native "mainers" are cringing that a lot of us Long Islanders are looking to head up their way! For me, Maine is a lot like Long Island used to be. Long Island has pretty much lost its luster, that's for sure.

That being said - it's a bit of a dream for my wife and I to move up to Maine. It's a tough call because I'm not positive that we'd be able to make the same kind of money that we do here. And I've looked at houses in the Portland area (Cape, Scarborough, Yarmouth, etc.) - they're not cheap! But if the stars align and jobs open up, you never know.

We were just up there - we did a lot of sniffing around. Loved Scarborough - especially the Higgins Beach area. We also shot up Rt 1 to Camden - and fell in love with that area.

I don't read much on here about Scarborough OR Camden - anyone ever consider living in either area?

[MRVphotog]

Although Scarborough and Camden are both summer busy they are very diferent communites.

Scarborough is part of the Portland sprawl so like Falmouth no real village center but is a bedroom community for the Portland, lots of sprawl but the beaches are nice.

Camden is pretty much a summer place. They recently had a business problem when MBNA which had renovated a beautiful bulding and provided pretty high paid employment. Unfortunately when they got bought by Bank of America most of their large business centers including the new one in Rockland and the one in Camden were left empty.

Camden is gorgeous but it's mostly a summer economy although they do have a cool little ski hill which holds the National Toboggen Championships every year. An amazing and fun event. Probably the only ski hill in the country that has a view of the ocean. Here is pic of Camden I took a few years ago.

[abundantsun]

My wife and I are considering Cape Elizabeth. I'm wondering if anyone knows how we'll be received there as she is Thai and I'm white.