In your personal opinion where is the best place to raise kids ?

[Guineas]

Originally Posted by FL_Expert

There are a lot of great places to raise kids. A few places that immediately come to mind are:

• Bellevue/Mercer Island, WA

Take your pick, it's just a matter of what your other preferences are.

Eh Bellevue and Mercer Island are overrated for raising kids in the area. There are many good alternatives for raising kids in the Puget Sound region. Most of Mercer Island doesn't even have sidewalks and requires interstate driving in both directions to do many basic amenities. Their main appeal is the good school districts, but when you're buying $2-3M+ single family homes, isn't it a bit weird to obsess over public school districts? The good private schools here are still far superior to the best public schools in the region in terms of top college matriculation. I know several families who bought in Mercer Island or the Eastside for the good public schools, only to go private when their kids actually got to experience the good public schools for themselves. The teachers weren't significantly better than anywhere else and neither was the curriculum, they just had more students with overachieving parents.

There's too much bias for the suburbs in this thread. A lot of cities are fine places to raise kids too. Many cities have quieter, suburban like neighborhoods with good access to amenities and a less sheltered disposition which might be good for raising your kids.

[TheTimidBlueBars]

Originally Posted by Guineas

Eh Bellevue and Mercer Island are overrated for raising kids in the area. There are many good alternatives for raising kids in the Puget Sound region. Most of Mercer Island doesn't even have sidewalks and requires interstate driving in both directions to do many basic amenities. Their main appeal is the good school districts, but when you're buying $2-3M+ single family homes, isn't it a bit weird to obsess over public school districts? The good private schools here are still far superior to the best public schools in the region in terms of top college matriculation. I know several families who bought in Mercer Island or the Eastside for the good public schools, only to go private when their kids actually got to experience the good public schools for themselves. The teachers weren't significantly better than anywhere else and neither was the curriculum, they just had more students with overachieving parents.

There's too much bias for the suburbs in this thread. A lot of cities are fine places to raise kids too. Many cities have quieter, suburban like neighborhoods with good access to amenities and a less sheltered disposition which might be good for raising your kids.

Agreed. I would feel like I was depriving my kids of life if I raised them in a quiet suburban area with no sidewalks and no nearby walkable commercial areas, no way for them to get out of the house and do things with friends.

Taking COL into account, my first choices would be cities like Minneapolis/St. Paul, Chicago, Philadelphia(? don't know it well), Denver, or Portland. City proper or inner-ring suburb. Seattle if I could afford it.