Need help moving to the 'burbs (Chicago, Naperville: homes, neighborhoods, to buy)

[zab123]

Hi all,

We'll be moving to the Chicago area soon -- new office on Michigan Avenue - and are looking for your insights about a handful of suburbs that we have identified for our young and growing family. Mostly we have looked for a mix of strong schools, decent commute to the city, varied housing stock, public safety, a sense of community w/nice downtown areas, parks/rec/medical amenities etc etc.; our list includes:

Flossmoor
Downers Grove
Glen Ellyn
Wheaton

We'll appreciate any and all comments: good reasons to buy/not to buy in a certain area based on your local knowledge/expertise!

Thanks.

[Cinema]

I can give you some info on Flossmoor. It's a wonderful community and definitely meets all your requirements. The school and park district is Homewood-Flossmoor. The park district is tops, offers just about anything and everything you'd want your child(ren) to be involved in. And lots of wonderful adult programs too. The surrounding park districts are nice too and have a recipricol(sp?) program where you pay in-district costs for their district programs.

Downtown doesn't impress me though, but that's just me, as far as I know it's one block of shops along the metra (commuter train) line, but the shops are nice (quaint) -- it could be a larger area, I'm not sure. Library is beautiful, has been redone. There are lots of nice shops in Homewood's downtown too (FYI, you should add Homewood to your list). The schools in Homewood are top-rated, the way they breakout is that each school services 2 grades (Willow is pre-k-2nd, Churchill is 3rd-4th, etc.). Obviously the drawback is that one year you may be close to the grade school, another year not so much.

Flossmoor schools are k-5 then there's one jr. high. The high school is also excellent (Homewood-Flossmoor High School), however, there have been a few racial incidents in the past year but I don't believe its indicitive of the school at large, just a few boneheads acting like asses. Beautiful homes, you get a lot for your money and the range can be $150,000 all the way to $2 mil. The community would get my vote. Check out the link below, just a short photo gallery of the area, plus you can go back to the home page and get more info. Of course, most communities put their best foot forward on the web, but the pics pretty much tell an accurate story. http://www.flossmoor.org/birds_eye.html (broken link)

Hope this helps.

[Cinema]

Edited to add the commute from Flossmoor to Chicago is about 45-50 minutes, depending on which train you catch. And when you come up from the train station you're on Michigan Avenue.

[nanannie]

I would add Elmhurst,Naperville and Geneva to your list as it has all the requirements you mentioned.The towns,schools ,Parks ,surrounding areas,are nice ,safe,(as are Wheaton,Glen Ellyn,Downers grove)and are aprox. 1/2 hr to the city.I just happen to prefer all of these over the South Suburbs,personal taste.You out to back track and read previous pages,there is much info on the suburbs

[carryd]

Add Libertyville to your list as well. My husband and I lived in Greek Town until the kiddies came along and then we moved to the burbs. I commuted to the city via the Metra until the second came along and now I work from home for my hubby. The neighborhoods are beautiful with mix of older homes, reconstructed homes and new $1 mil+ homes. Young families with children are everywhere. The best schools, Metra, parks, library, downtown libertyville, restaurants, bars, Starbucks, Caribou and the Farmers Market are within walking distance from the home. Major expressways are a few minutes car ride from the home. Most of the neighborhoods are filled with young or middle aged down to earth, friendly, professionals with families. Another huge factor in our move was the fact that Condell hospital and the Center Club were also blocks from the home.