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View Poll Results: Where would you live?
Fairfield county 4 23.53%
New Haven county 7 41.18%
Shoreline/near the water 6 35.29%
Move back to NYC 0 0%
Voters: 17. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 03-11-2009, 02:58 PM
 
Location: Guilford, CT
9 posts, read 13,261 times
Reputation: 20

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Put yourself in this situation:

1) you work from home, but commute to different locations in the tri-state area a few times a month. Mostly NYC, but Boston and Jersey too.

2) you have a budget of $400K ($350 would be best).

3) you have a ten year old daughter who stays with you 2 months out of the year (read: 2BR/2BA required (reread: 2BA, not 1.5 - she'll be a teen soon)).

My real estate agent is going nuts because he's never had this come up. I'm in North Guilford now and while it would be nice to be closer to NYC (read: Fairfield or closer), I'm not opposed to the "right place" in Madison or anywhere along the shoreline.

I looked in New Haven, Fair Haven, and East Haven (even on the beach) and "wasn't feeling it".

Fairfield has some small condos, but I'm looking for something with at least 1200 sq. ft.

Blackrock is nice and there are some affordable properties, but the tax is near double that of anything else I've seen in CT.

I'm really confused (even after reading some posts in this forum) with Stamford and Norwalk. The places that are considered "nice" and "safe" in the forum seemed neither "nice" nor "safe", IMHO. SoNo *seemed* congested and rundown. I don't think I want to buy into a neighborhood with such a large project under way either. Who knows what the neighborhood is going to look like after it's done?

In Stamford, the closer you get to the water, the worse it is?! How did that happen?

Any suggestions on where to look next?
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Old 03-11-2009, 03:45 PM
 
756 posts, read 2,218,377 times
Reputation: 635
Quote:
Originally Posted by mjoseff View Post
Put yourself in this situation:

1) you work from home, but commute to different locations in the tri-state area a few times a month. Mostly NYC, but Boston and Jersey too.

2) you have a budget of $400K ($350 would be best).

3) you have a ten year old daughter who stays with you 2 months out of the year (read: 2BR/2BA required (reread: 2BA, not 1.5 - she'll be a teen soon)).

My real estate agent is going nuts because he's never had this come up. I'm in North Guilford now and while it would be nice to be closer to NYC (read: Fairfield or closer), I'm not opposed to the "right place" in Madison or anywhere along the shoreline.

I looked in New Haven, Fair Haven, and East Haven (even on the beach) and "wasn't feeling it".

Fairfield has some small condos, but I'm looking for something with at least 1200 sq. ft.

Blackrock is nice and there are some affordable properties, but the tax is near double that of anything else I've seen in CT.

I'm really confused (even after reading some posts in this forum) with Stamford and Norwalk. The places that are considered "nice" and "safe" in the forum seemed neither "nice" nor "safe", IMHO. SoNo *seemed* congested and rundown. I don't think I want to buy into a neighborhood with such a large project under way either. Who knows what the neighborhood is going to look like after it's done?

In Stamford, the closer you get to the water, the worse it is?! How did that happen?

Any suggestions on where to look next?
Milford!
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Old 03-11-2009, 03:52 PM
 
Location: Guilford, CT
9 posts, read 13,261 times
Reputation: 20
Quote:
Originally Posted by usmcfamily View Post
Milford!
I checked Milford near the water - the houses that I looked at in my price range were mostly "as is" fixer uppers.

Any part of Milford specifically you could recommend I search?
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Old 03-11-2009, 04:00 PM
 
Location: Danbury CT covering all of Fairfield County
2,637 posts, read 7,427,019 times
Reputation: 1378
How about the Danbury area? You can get some newer 2 bedroom 2.5 bath townhomes starting in the high $200s.
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Old 03-11-2009, 04:31 PM
 
1,231 posts, read 2,686,936 times
Reputation: 582
Middlebury, Southbury, Naugatuck, anywhere in New Haven County. Doubt you'll find your match in Ffld county.
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Old 03-11-2009, 05:23 PM
 
756 posts, read 2,218,377 times
Reputation: 635
A couple of questions for you and then maybe I can give you a little more help! How important is it to be on the water? Are you looking at house or condo? In today's market, 400k will buy you a decent, small, older house in some very nice towns in Ffld County (Trumbull, Newtown, Monroe, Shelton). However, these towns are not on the water.

To answer your question about Milford, when we looked, we were told to stay north of the Post Rd.

West Haven has a strip along the beach with lots of condo's. The ocean is literally across the street. Have you looked there?

I live in Monroe and love it. We have a condo complex called Northbrook that has decent size condo's. I am sure they are at least 1200-1500 sq. feet at a minimum. The complex is very nice.They have a pool and trails for bike riding and are not too far from our gorgeous town park, Wolfe Park. I am not sure what the prices are and the commute into NYC would not be fun but it would be nice when your daughter stays with you.

Give us some more feedback and we can narrow down more specific areas to help you with
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Old 03-11-2009, 07:15 PM
 
362 posts, read 774,596 times
Reputation: 140
why not Hartford?
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Old 03-11-2009, 07:32 PM
 
184 posts, read 842,330 times
Reputation: 74
I would recommend the Danbury area for easy access to the tri-state area. Placed at the junction of 7 and 84, with easy access to 684 (quick drive to NY and NJ, so much easier that traveling on 95 or the Merritt) as well as the highways up to Massachusetts, I don't think you can go wrong. Unless you'd rather travel by Metro North and Amtrak, then its the shoreline.

So Danbury, Bethel, Brookfield, New Fairfield, I think would all be good. It's not the shoreline proper but you have Candlewood Lake!
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Old 03-11-2009, 08:24 PM
 
21,616 posts, read 31,180,666 times
Reputation: 9775
Quote:
Originally Posted by seymourct View Post
Middlebury, Southbury, Naugatuck, anywhere in New Haven County. Doubt you'll find your match in Ffld county.
Agreed. Somewhere in Northwestern New Haven County (Valley, Southbury), or maybe Shelton or Stratford.
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Old 03-11-2009, 08:40 PM
 
Location: Near the Coast SWCT
83,500 posts, read 75,234,500 times
Reputation: 16619
See my responses after your questions:

Quote:
Originally Posted by mjoseff View Post

1) you work from home, but commute to different locations in the tri-state area a few times a month. Mostly NYC, but Boston and Jersey too. You will hate I-95 but in 2 years all that will be in the past. They are in the process of expanding finally.

2) you have a budget of $400K ($350 would be best). Thats an updated 2Br condo in Fairfield county or a 2BR single family home fixxer upper.

Fairfield has some small condos, but I'm looking for something with at least 1200 sq. ft. You will definetly find something in the cove section of Stamford

I'm really confused (even after reading some posts in this forum) with Stamford and Norwalk. The places that are considered "nice" and "safe" in the forum seemed neither "nice" nor "safe", IMHO. SoNo *seemed* congested and rundown. I don't think I want to buy into a neighborhood with such a large project under way either. Who knows what the neighborhood is going to look like after it's done? Stay away from SONO. Period.

In Stamford, the closer you get to the water, the worse it is?! How did that happen? Nope. Go take a ride in the shippan area on the peninsula. Homes are over $800k there and a georgeous area. Cove section near the water did get worse over the years. What a shame but the park is still nice.

Any suggestions on where to look next?Try East Norwalk or Milford or Lordship community in Stratford. Its really tough with that budget. Why not rent first?
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