Tranferring to San Jose-best place to live with kids (Mountain View: rentals, house prices)

[ILWoods]

We're considering a transfer to San Jose. What are your opinions on the best places surrounding SJ to live with kids. Here are our requirements:

-Housing up to $1.5M
-4 kids in Elem, Middle and High School
-Would like to have Good-Great public schools for them, will also consider private
-Would like a community feel. (I'm tired of suburbia)

Thanks!

[novaman]

My sister in law lives in Saratoga and touts it as one of the best spots. The schools are supposed to be excellent.

[Luke9686]

With that budget, you will have many choices.

Saratoga is very nice, with great schools. Other areas to consider are Los Altos, Palo Alto (not East Palo Alto, very different), Cupertino, and Los Gatos.

Most of the San Jose is suburbia, unfortunately.

I'm not sure of San Jose public schools. If you want more of an urban feel, and can find a private school that suits your needs, I would check out the Willow Glen and Rose Garden neighborhoods. You can do a Craigslist search for those areas, just to get an idea of what the housing stock looks like.

[ILWoods]

Originally Posted by novaman

My sister in law lives in Saratoga and touts it as one of the best spots. The schools are supposed to be excellent.

Thanks for your reply. Your SIL is in the public school system?

Originally Posted by Luke9686

With that budget, you will have many choices.

Saratoga is very nice, with great schools. Other areas to consider are Los Altos, Palo Alto (not East Palo Alto, very different), Cupertino, and Los Gatos.

Most of the San Jose is suburbia, unfortunately.

I'm not sure of San Jose public schools. If you want more of an urban feel, and can find a private school that suits your needs, I would check out the Willow Glen and Rose Garden neighborhoods. You can do a Craigslist search for those areas, just to get an idea of what the housing stock looks like.

Great idea! My husband's job will be in San Jose. He wants to try to stay close to the area. Is the traffic/commute from Los Altos, Palo Alto, Los Gatos heavy?

[Luke9686]

Where at in San Jose?? San Jose is a HUGE city. But in general, traffic in the entire bay area is aweful. Living close to work, if possible, would be a huge relief.

[ILWoods]

I think around Willow Glen...Hamilton Rd. I know we'd ideally like to send all four kids to public schools, so we are focusing on the school districts. And with this move I really do not want to live in suburbia.

[hsw]

PaloAlto...prob best public schools in CA; eclectic intellectual/economic mix of Stanford grad students, faculty...and many major tech billionaires...all living a few doors apart

Prob smarter to rent in PA....house prices, even in upscale areas, are just beginning to soften...IIRC, some 50% of PA's housing stock is rentals

280 fwy btwn PA and SJ is perhaps fastest urban fwy in world....esp the PA-SV AM and SV-PA PM flows are notably fast, as it's a more upscale, less populated route into the PA area....worst traffic tends to be anything to/from EastBay or deep into SouthBay

Many car nuts who moved to SF/SV from NYC continue to be astonished about pace/efficiency of 280 fwy...which allows many singles to live up in SF and easily commute the 35mis to offices in MenloPk in ~35mins....and easily blitz deep into SV for mtgs w/tech cos.....280 truly is the US autobahn and makes QOL of SF Peninsula one of highest in world, w/offices easily accessed from where most execs prefer to reside

[sonarrat]

Originally Posted by ILWoods

Thanks for your reply. Your SIL is in the public school system?

Great idea! My husband's job will be in San Jose. He wants to try to stay close to the area. Is the traffic/commute from Los Altos, Palo Alto, Los Gatos heavy?

The north to south commute is not bad, except between Palo Alto and Mountain View on 101. Los Gatos to SJ can be heavy on 17/880 because of all the traffic coming over the hill from Santa Cruz.

[novaman]

Originally Posted by ILWoods

Thanks for your reply. Your SIL is in the public school system?

Yes her oldest is now in college. She was happy with the education her kids have received but did mention that the PTA is forced to do a lot of fundraising to be able to hire teachers for the arts and other things...apparently something that the state does not provide. This came as a bit of a surprise to me living in Va.

[san carlos]

Saratoga and Palo Alto? I think you'll be hard-pressed to find anything in either of those cities for $1.5M that will be big enough for a family of 6. Willow Glen is nice, and you can also look in Campbell -- that should keep you pretty close to San Jose, commute wise.