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Hi! My wife and I may be moving to the DC area to take a job in the city. Closest metro stop would be Foggy Bottom on the Orange/Blue/Silver line. In our early 30s, no kids, one dog, looking for something with good metro access and a safe neighborhood. Not sure if we would rent or buy yet, depends on the final details of the position, but if buying budget would be up to 300k, possibly with some wiggle room. Still very preliminary, but I like to do all the research I can. Thanks for any suggestions!
Is the job walking distance from Dupont Circle as well? If not, that'll limit you to PG county and Northern VA (and DC proper, obviously). Let us know what size place you need for that budget and hopefully some PG residents will speak up with suggestions.
Talk to your lender first - Figure out what your mortgage amount would be, what it get you home-wise and compare your monthly spend for each, and what is available in your budget for each. Depending on where you choose to live, buying may save you money - if you plan to stay.
Early 30's couple with first grader looking for a small community - is MD for us?
Hi all, I'm a longtime lurker/googler of the CityData forums and just created an account for the first time because I'm considering a move for graduate school. Mods, I apologize if this post should be somewhere else or its own thread because it's so long. Please feel free to move/delete it if so.
I'm an older (early 30s) graduate student considering UMD among a couple of other universities. My girlfriend and her nearly 5-year-old daughter will be moving with me in Fall 2018. My program will be 4 years, but because of the little girl, we want to settle in or near the town where my grad program is so as not to move her once she starts first grade. Our other two options are the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass) and the University of Virginia (UVA). I've searched the forums and googled a lot to find information and would really appreciate some personalized responses. Below are some of the considerations I've been thinking about:
My girlfriend is from the Bay Area, and I have lived there for many years, so we'd like someplace kind of contemporary, if not less crowded and a bit more rural. We are not hipsters but do enjoy craft beer, like outdoor activities, sometimes do yoga, shop small businesses, are politically moderate/independent/lean left (not too involved), are spiritually "new-age", and appreciate improv comedy clubs, karaoke, live music venues, and sports, especially football and hockey. Not huge party people, don't go to dance clubs or get wasted on the weekends.
We like the prospect of having 4 seasons but having winters that aren't as cold as in New England.
Being within 1 hour of the ocean/bay is a plus.
Likewise, being close to airports is a plus. We'd be flying at least a couple times per year to visit her family in California and mine in Massachusetts. (Or alternatively driving 6 hours up to MA.) By the time short stack graduates from high school, my parents will be in their 80s, which is a little hard for me to swallow potentially living so far away. (UMass would be much closer to them, but UMD may give me better funding opportunities for my program.)
We both have family/friends in the DC area who have moved there, which is a plus. Our spiritual denomination in CA has churches in the MD/DC area, too, a big plus for the little girl who does Sunday School.
We appreciated the diverse food in the Bay Area, especially Indian and Mexican food and hope to find someplace with decent, if not great, ethnic cuisine.
Having grown up in New England and having lived close enough to Lake Tahoe for weekend trips, a lack of skiing might be hard to take. Same with hiking.
We'd be looking for somewhere with a lot of green space and less urban, homes with yards - willing to commute up to 30, maybe 45 minutes to UMD in College Park. This is a major concern for me moving so close to DC, enough that it might negate all the pluses. I don't like living in the Bay Area because it's so crowded and congested - much more so than even 10 years ago. UVA and UMass are very attractive because of their rural/small city settings.
Home prices look cheaper than the Bay Area, but still on the expensive side. Charlottesville (UVA) and Western Massachusetts (UMass) both have cheaper homes, and the DC area looks only a bit better than the Bay Area in that regard. We'd be considering saving a few years for a down payment, buying a duplex and renting out the other side, with the intention of eventually upgrading our home and keeping the duplex for a dual rental income. Looking initially to find a 2-3 bedroom for $2000-2400/mo.
Schools are important, obviously, as is finding a community with other similarly-aged parents or parents with kids similarly-aged. We'd like to find a neighborhood that is "settled" without people moving in and out all the time, with younger couples or couples with younger kids like us, that is pretty mainstream in terms of American culture. We'd like to make friends and be involved with our community.
My girlfriend is an experienced college administrator who has worked with managing post-doc appointments and also some financial/business aspects of a major university medical school but does not manage people, nor does she want to. She hopes to find a similar position, whether at UMD or another college/university. Her salary in the Bay Area is in the range of $75-85k, and we're ok with taking a salary cut for a lower cost of living and quality-of-life improvements - and hopefully we will be paying less money in taxes than in California.
After my graduate program, I will practice school psychology with a PhD and will be looking for a job with a school district, although would be open to post-secondary teaching opportunities and practicing privately, as well. I know that school psychologists are in demand in Western Massachusetts and think that the job market is good in the DC area but not sure.
Any suggestions for us based on the above information? Is Annapolis or AA county good? How about Columbia? Should we consider commuting from NoVA? Do you think we'd find what we're looking for in the MD (or VA) side of DC, or does it sound like the area is not for us? General info/advice is also encouraged and appreciated. Thanks in advance for your replies.
Hello! My family is considering relocating to the metro area. My husband has some job prospects in Alexandria, VA. We would like his commute to be less than 45 minutes. The basics about us...
House budget is 300-400K.
Family of 6, Homeschooling stay-at-home mom
Looking for homeschooling resources (groups, co-ops, classes, homeschool sports leagues)
conservative Christians looking for good church family (please no political posts)
Low crime neighborhood recommendations?
Should we buy in MD or VA?
Hi all, I'm a longtime lurker/googler of the CityData forums and just created an account for the first time because I'm considering a move for graduate school. Mods, I apologize if this post should be somewhere else or its own thread because it's so long. Please feel free to move/delete it if so.
-trimmed --
I'm an older (early 30s) graduate student considering UMD among a couple of other universities.
Any suggestions for us based on the above information? Is Annapolis or AA county good? How about Columbia? Should we consider commuting from NoVA? Do you think we'd find what we're looking for in the MD (or VA) side of DC, or does it sound like the area is not for us? General info/advice is also encouraged and appreciated. Thanks in advance for your replies.
You could try University Park where I live, just south of UMD, often confused with it's northern neighbor College Park.
It's all single family houses, no commercial - but there's a lot of retail and eateries right nearby. Many of your neighbors would be UMD faculty or in some cases staff with relatively few students. Much of it looks like something out of a John Hughes movie. While the immediate area can get crowded and congested, if you're inside the town you wouldn't notice. (And if you're going into DC, much of the town is a 20 minute walk or less to one of two Metro stations.) The town and the civic organization have a lot of events for families and adults alike. Being near a big university means a lot cultural and sports stuff, and of course DC is nearby. It's mostly owner-occupied but you might well find a rental house in your price range, which will be tough to do in areas that are generally more upscale further west.
The catch? You know there's a catch. It's Prince George's County. (You don't know what that means yet, but you'll find out.) The Elementary School (K-6) here is rated decently, but the upper-level schools are dicier, as UP is quite a bit more affluent than most anything else in the immediate area. We do get quite a few folks who shell out for private school once their kid hits Grade 7. If they have multiple kids, especially 3 or more, they often head further away to get out of PG County. The government service quality doesn't have the best reputation, which is why many municipalities formed to take care of many services. (In this state, things default to the counties rather than to cities/towns, as much of MD has no government below the county level, even some very urban areas. Very different from New England.)
If you can't deal with that, then you're probably looking at a long commute because any place zoned to good schools around here commands a serious premium. People who can't afford that but still want a detached house with a yard usually head to Howard or Anne Arundel Counties, which might not bad if you're only going to College Park. (I work downtown, so that skews my perception.) I don't know what the rental house market looks like out that far.
Answer Guy, thanks for the detailed response! I'll definitely check out UP. That looks like a near zero commute to UMD and the population density looks decent at first glance (5k/sq mi vs. 9k for Silver Spring, yikes!) I have heard that about the county system in MD and yes, it does seem weird to me at first glance, but the way you explained it makes sense about the schools.
What about towns farther outside, like the small towns between Columbia and College Park? Or Bethesda, Rockville, Colesville, Cloverly, or towns in that area? Would those be outside our price range? Better or worse quality schools than PG county? I know that we're locked into a lower price in the Bay Area having lived in the same place for a while, but that's the price range we're paying here for a 2br/1ba, and I'd hate to move somewhere with a lower cost of living and pay more in rent.
Answer Guy, thanks for the detailed response! I'll definitely check out UP. That looks like a near zero commute to UMD and the population density looks decent at first glance (5k/sq mi vs. 9k for Silver Spring, yikes!) I have heard that about the county system in MD and yes, it does seem weird to me at first glance, but the way you explained it makes sense about the schools.
What about towns farther outside, like the small towns between Columbia and College Park? Or Bethesda, Rockville, Colesville, Cloverly, or towns in that area? Would those be outside our price range? Better or worse quality schools than PG county? I know that we're locked into a lower price in the Bay Area having lived in the same place for a while, but that's the price range we're paying here for a 2br/1ba, and I'd hate to move somewhere with a lower cost of living and pay more in rent.
I would also give north Bowie a look. Bowie as a whole is nice but north Bowie meets a lot of your criteria. By north Bowie, I'm referencing the area north of Rt 50, east of 197, and the neighborhoods to the right bordering 197. This area is safe, quiet, diverse families, and mostly residential, and offers nice trails for horse riding, biking, running, and even a water trail for canoeing/kayaking along the Patuxent River. Bowie also has a number of great parks. The best elementary and middle schools in Bowie (8 and 9 star rated on Great Schools) are Whitehall ES, Tulip Grove ES, Yorktown ES, Samuel Ogle MS, and Heather Hills in the southern part of Bowie. North Bowie will also give you easy access to Rt 50 which you can use to get to Annapolis and the bay, or DC in the other direction, and 295 which you can use to get to BWI airport and Baltimore. You're also near 564 (Lanhan Severn Rd) which you can take to Greenbelt Rd to get to College Park. This route isn't congested in the mornings and offers a nice commute to UMD (~25-30 mins). The shopping and restaurants could be better but Crofton is close by and convenient for that. I would also recommend giving Crofton a look as that might meet most of your criteria also.
Hi all, I'm a longtime lurker/googler of the CityData forums and just created an account for the first time because I'm considering a move for graduate school. Mods, I apologize if this post should be somewhere else or its own thread because it's so long. Please feel free to move/delete it if so.
I'm an older (early 30s) graduate student considering UMD among a couple of other universities. My girlfriend and her nearly 5-year-old daughter will be moving with me in Fall 2018. My program will be 4 years, but because of the little girl, we want to settle in or near the town where my grad program is so as not to move her once she starts first grade. Our other two options are the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass) and the University of Virginia (UVA). I've searched the forums and googled a lot to find information and would really appreciate some personalized responses. Below are some of the considerations I've been thinking about:
My girlfriend is from the Bay Area, and I have lived there for many years, so we'd like someplace kind of contemporary, if not less crowded and a bit more rural. We are not hipsters but do enjoy craft beer, like outdoor activities, sometimes do yoga, shop small businesses, are politically moderate/independent/lean left (not too involved), are spiritually "new-age", and appreciate improv comedy clubs, karaoke, live music venues, and sports, especially football and hockey. Not huge party people, don't go to dance clubs or get wasted on the weekends.
We like the prospect of having 4 seasons but having winters that aren't as cold as in New England.
Being within 1 hour of the ocean/bay is a plus.
Likewise, being close to airports is a plus. We'd be flying at least a couple times per year to visit her family in California and mine in Massachusetts. (Or alternatively driving 6 hours up to MA.) By the time short stack graduates from high school, my parents will be in their 80s, which is a little hard for me to swallow potentially living so far away. (UMass would be much closer to them, but UMD may give me better funding opportunities for my program.)
We both have family/friends in the DC area who have moved there, which is a plus. Our spiritual denomination in CA has churches in the MD/DC area, too, a big plus for the little girl who does Sunday School.
We appreciated the diverse food in the Bay Area, especially Indian and Mexican food and hope to find someplace with decent, if not great, ethnic cuisine.
Having grown up in New England and having lived close enough to Lake Tahoe for weekend trips, a lack of skiing might be hard to take. Same with hiking.
We'd be looking for somewhere with a lot of green space and less urban, homes with yards - willing to commute up to 30, maybe 45 minutes to UMD in College Park. This is a major concern for me moving so close to DC, enough that it might negate all the pluses. I don't like living in the Bay Area because it's so crowded and congested - much more so than even 10 years ago. UVA and UMass are very attractive because of their rural/small city settings.
Home prices look cheaper than the Bay Area, but still on the expensive side. Charlottesville (UVA) and Western Massachusetts (UMass) both have cheaper homes, and the DC area looks only a bit better than the Bay Area in that regard. We'd be considering saving a few years for a down payment, buying a duplex and renting out the other side, with the intention of eventually upgrading our home and keeping the duplex for a dual rental income. Looking initially to find a 2-3 bedroom for $2000-2400/mo.
Schools are important, obviously, as is finding a community with other similarly-aged parents or parents with kids similarly-aged. We'd like to find a neighborhood that is "settled" without people moving in and out all the time, with younger couples or couples with younger kids like us, that is pretty mainstream in terms of American culture. We'd like to make friends and be involved with our community.
My girlfriend is an experienced college administrator who has worked with managing post-doc appointments and also some financial/business aspects of a major university medical school but does not manage people, nor does she want to. She hopes to find a similar position, whether at UMD or another college/university. Her salary in the Bay Area is in the range of $75-85k, and we're ok with taking a salary cut for a lower cost of living and quality-of-life improvements - and hopefully we will be paying less money in taxes than in California.
After my graduate program, I will practice school psychology with a PhD and will be looking for a job with a school district, although would be open to post-secondary teaching opportunities and practicing privately, as well. I know that school psychologists are in demand in Western Massachusetts and think that the job market is good in the DC area but not sure.
Any suggestions for us based on the above information? Is Annapolis or AA county good? How about Columbia? Should we consider commuting from NoVA? Do you think we'd find what we're looking for in the MD (or VA) side of DC, or does it sound like the area is not for us? General info/advice is also encouraged and appreciated. Thanks in advance for your replies.
There are drive time widgets on search websites that can help you scope a distance. However, a 45 minute drive time search at 9am for 3 bedroom, 2 bath homes yields over 2500 single family homes for sale under $400,000 reaching all the way into Baltimore to the north, the Potomac River to the east and Charles County to the south.
It is worth the time to look at the closer areas first based on our heavy DC Metro area traffic.
I live in Gaithersburg, MD, 20878 and there is plenty of green space, highly ranked schools, lots of jobs, and easy access to hiking and biking everywhere. It is 2 1/2 hours to Bethany Beach, DE for the shore. There are many homes under $400,000 and there are currently 66 rentals in the 20878 zip code starting at $1700 per month for a 3 bed 3 bath townhouse.
From Gaithersburg, BWI airport, Dulles in VA, and Reagan in DC are all about an hour away. Here is a link to a Washington Post article on The Kentlands which is a great community to live in within Gaithersburg. https://www.washingtonpost.com/reale...=.b5e9557510bc
Hello! My family is considering relocating to the metro area. My husband has some job prospects in Alexandria, VA. We would like his commute to be less than 45 minutes. The basics about us...
House budget is 300-400K.
Family of 6, Homeschooling stay-at-home mom
Looking for homeschooling resources (groups, co-ops, classes, homeschool sports leagues)
conservative Christians looking for good church family (please no political posts)
Low crime neighborhood recommendations?
Should we buy in MD or VA?
I would definitely look to stay in VA for better commuting options in Alexandria, VA. There are 36 single family homes for sale in Alexandria for less than $400,000. Extending further into Fairfax County, you will have even more options. You may even consider renting for a year since you are unfamiliar with such a large metro area. I suggest the the app NEXTDOOR to poll neighbors to find out about home schooling resources once you can pin down some neighborhoods. Moderator cut: Link removed, linking to competitor sites is not allowed will give you crime data.
I would also give north Bowie a look...also recommend giving Crofton a look as that might meet most of your criteria also.
Thank you. Those two are definitely on my radar.
Quote:
Originally Posted by davidbengel
...a 45 minute drive time search at 9am for 3 bedroom, 2 bath homes yields over 2500 single family homes for sale under $400,000 reaching all the way into Baltimore to the north, the Potomac River to the east and Charles County to the south.
-----
I live in Gaithersburg, MD, 20878 and there is plenty of green space, highly ranked schools, lots of jobs, and easy access to hiking and biking everywhere. It is 2 1/2 hours to Bethany Beach, DE for the shore.
Thanks for all the info. Do you mind sharing what tool(s) you used to yield those home results? It would be great to search for homes for sale by drive time if possible.
Also, do people go to Annapolis or other towns on the Bay or on the Potomac like they would go to the beach? Or do you need to go all the way to the oceanfront in Delaware to get that? Living near any body of water is nice, but it would be great to live closer to some shoreline, especially in lieu of mountains - I've lived all but 2.5 years of my life within 90 minutes of ocean beaches and all my life surrounded by mountains or hills.
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Early 30's couple with first grader looking for a small community - is MD for us?
