Moving from So Cal to Atlanta (Sandy Springs, Dunwoody: for sale, real estate, oceanfront)

[rowansmama413]

I would love to get some advice... my husband and I (and our 15 month old son) are moving from Redondo Beach, CA (Los Angeles) to Atlanta in about a month and a half. My husband just got a promotion and will be working a couple days a week downtown Atlanta. Neither of us has spent much time out there, and have no idea where to start looking for a home. Because of my husband's generous relocation package through his company, it is best for us to buy a home right away.

Can anyone tell me areas that are good for young families, close to good restaurants/shopping, near good schools/parks, safe neighborhood, don't want to spend more than $500k on the house? We'd love to have close to what we're leaving behind here

Thank you in advance for your help!

[AnsleyPark]

Please contact a local realtor. I'd look in the Morningside / Virginia-Highland area to start with.

[Atlanta_BD]

Originally Posted by AnsleyPark

Please contact a local realtor. I'd look in the Morningside / Virginia-Highland area to start with.

I second this area. Schools are great and there's access to restaurants, boutique shopping, parks and things to do; but the houses in this area usually start at $750k. The City of Decatur also has great schools, restaurants and great boutiques to shop at. Houses there usually start at around $600k but you may be able to find something (but not many) at $500k in the Oakhurst neighborhood.

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by rowansmama413

I would love to get some advice... my husband and I (and our 15 month old son) are moving from Redondo Beach, CA (Los Angeles) to Atlanta in about a month and a half. My husband just got a promotion and will be working a couple days a week downtown Atlanta. Neither of us has spent much time out there, and have no idea where to start looking for a home. Because of my husband's generous relocation package through his company, it is best for us to buy a home right away.

Can anyone tell me areas that are good for young families, close to good restaurants/shopping, near good schools/parks, safe neighborhood, don't want to spend more than $500k on the house? We'd love to have close to what we're leaving behind here

Thank you in advance for your help!

Here's a link to the Homefinder page of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (what's left of Atlanta's main daily newspaper...the AJC is to Atlanta what the Los Angeles Times is to L.A.) with real estate listings for homes for $500,000 and under all over the Metro Atlanta region. You can look through these listings and see if you find anything you like:
Atlanta GA Homes for sales | Atlanta Journal Constitution

Like previous posters have stated, the Morningside-Lenox Park, Virginia-Highland and the City of Decatur are good areas for you to start your search.

Since your husband will only be working 2 days a week in Downtown Atlanta, you could also expand your search to a wider area (if he's up for a commute a couple of days weekly) like Druid Hills, North Druid Hills, Oak Grove, Buckhead, Brookhaven, Vinings, Sandy Springs and Dunwoody.

Good luck and I hope that you find something that you like

[deacongirl]

East Cobb.

[rowansmama413]

Thanks for this advice! We are in the process of choosing our realtor, but it's so helpful to have a head start on understanding the area

[Nast]

The Creative Loafing Neighborhood Guide can also be a good place to get some background on intown neighborhoods and some suburbs. It's not exhaustive, but it does serve as a good starting point in listing potential areas of interest:
Creative Loafing Atlanta | Neighborhood Guide

As far as finding a realtor, it may help to get an idea of which part of town you would like to live in. Many will specialize in certain areas, or intown, certain neighborhoods. That's not to say they couldn't help you, but you might find yourself being steered to an area because they are familiar with it, not necessarily because it fits your needs.

[lastminutemom]

Does your relocation plan require you to buy right away or will they accommodate you in short term housing (say a month to three months) with storage for your stuff?

To me, metro Atlanta is a hard place to pop in for a couple of days and figure out where to buy a home.

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by Nast

As far as finding a realtor, it may help to get an idea of which part of town you would like to live in. Many will specialize in certain areas, or intown, certain neighborhoods. That's not to say they couldn't help you, but you might find yourself being steered to an area because they are familiar with it, not necessarily because it fits your needs.

Originally Posted by lastminutemom

Does your relocation plan require you to buy right away or will they accommodate you in short term housing (say a month to three months) with storage for your stuff?

To me, metro Atlanta is a hard place to pop in for a couple of days and figure out where to buy a home.

Those are excellent points and that is excellent advice from Nast and lastminutemom.

If there is a way that you could stay in short-term housing for a few months, that would really help you and your family so that you can really get acquainted with the area.

The Atlanta area, while being a very large and sprawling city/metro area in regards to the Southeastern U.S. with a population of 6 million people and a land area of almost 10,000 square miles, still has only about a third of the population and land area as the Greater Los Angeles area.

The scale (the geographical and the socioeconomic and cultural makeup) of the Atlanta area is much different from Southern California, so it is really hard for us to truly compare the area in which you are currently living in Redondo Beach to anything that we may have out here.

That's because, for one, a very crucial element in the form of several miles of beach and oceanfront is missing and, second, I don't know if we quite have anything out here on the scale of where you live at in Redondo Beach.

From what I know about it, Redondo Beach seems to be a relatively very-affluent, high-density urban community of nearly 70,000 residents with what seems to be excellent (if not outstanding) public schools and some high-end urban village areas.

Don't get me wrong, the Atlanta area has some great urban neighborhoods inside of the I-285 Perimeter (which is the dividing line between the suburbs and the city in most cases, figuratively, culturally, socially and psychologically), but with the exception of the City of Decatur (which is an urban village area with excellent public schools that is popular with young professionals but is nowhere near the scale of a Redondo Beach), the public schools inside of (and very-close to) the I-285 Perimeter can be very hit-and-miss.

Because of this, it is not necessarily that uncommon for young professionals living in affluent or trendy areas inside of the I-285 Perimeter to send their kids to private school, depending on the neighborhood or the block, or the quality of the feeder schools, etc.

Unfortunately, most of the schools with the highest ratings are found in the Northern suburbs outside of the I-285 Perimeter in the areas of West Cobb, South Cherokee, East Cobb, North Fulton, West and South Forsyth and Gwinnett counties.

Because of this one major difference and other major factors, it is highly-recommended that you take lastminutemom's advice and (if possible) utilize short-term housing for up to a few months (if necessary) after relocating to the Atlanta area so that you can really explore and get acquainted with the area and really get to know what area would be right for you.

That's because there are some glaring geographical, topographical, social and cultural differences between the Los Angeles area and Southern California and the West Coast, and between the Atlanta and North Georgia and the Southeastern U.S. that you may not necessarily be able to figure out until you have arrived out here and have lived here for a few weeks or so.

And trying to figure the perfect place to live within a month without ever having visited the area is a really tall order.

[Peoepep]

Originally Posted by rowansmama413

I would love to get some advice... my husband and I (and our 15 month old son) are moving from Redondo Beach, CA (Los Angeles) to Atlanta in about a month and a half. My husband just got a promotion and will be working a couple days a week downtown Atlanta. Neither of us has spent much time out there, and have no idea where to start looking for a home. Because of my husband's generous relocation package through his company, it is best for us to buy a home right away.

Can anyone tell me areas that are good for young families, close to good restaurants/shopping, near good schools/parks, safe neighborhood, don't want to spend more than $500k on the house? We'd love to have close to what we're leaving behind here

Thank you in advance for your help!

You are in for quite the shock. Fear not though, other folks from LA have done it.