Bratinree or Quincy? (Boston, Cambridge, Weymouth: crime, houses, neighborhoods)

[Diskothek]

Its getting to be that time. Rings are on our fingers and we're going to get serious about homes.

We currently live in Quincy (I've been here my whole life) and she came down from Cambridge. She does not drive and has no plans to, so close to the T or on a bus route will be essential as she takes it into town for work. I currently work in Weymouth, but my office is moving to Norwell next year. Combined income currently just north of 70k. We're looking at a 250-300k price range. We are not planning on children now or in the future.

Right now I'm focused on Braintree since property taxes come out to about 1k less on average, crime isn't quite as bad and I'm also wary of the Quincy Center revitalization program. But am I putting too much stock into that? Its also tougher finding homes in a good spot for T access for her.

[pennyone]

When you look at these two cities, there are really big differences. Despite Braintree choosing to become a city through its change in government, it is still a small "town" by Quincy's standard. It only has 34,000 while Quincy is a huge city with a collection of neighborhoods, and a combined pop of more than 92,000. So you cannot compare little Braintree with the whole of Quincy.

I have several good friends who live in Braintree, and there are lots of good things about the affordable but nice town-city. It's relatively small and manageable, and it does have a T stop way at the end. But if your wife works in town, that Red line ride will be very very long each way. Your commute to Norwell, on the otherhand, will be shorter by a bit.

Quincy has many nice neighborhoods that are equally as nice or better than Braintree. Merrymounth by the coast, Squantum on the peninsula, or a variety of very nice houses with fine architecture in Wollaston come to mind. It also have high end areas like Presidents Hill etc with much bigger houses...but if you dont have kids, why pay for all those empty rooms? Quincy's schools are half/half...the better half is equally as good as Braintree's, but the average is brought down by the poor performing half that is associated with the lower income people who live in Point and Germantown. Schools are not so important for you so it's just something I am throwing out there.

Why are you wary of the city center project? It seems to be moving along just fine. It should rejuvenate the whole city's economy, and make property values rise. Some cleaning out of the various places around the city will most likely happen to prevent the "zombies"; Quincy has too many social services (like Father Bills), and with Red Line access, many from Boston flock to the city to take advantage of it. This has to stop and there is already pressure on the mayor to do this. At your price range, you should be able to find something smaller in a nice neighborhood of Quincy.

[Diskothek]

I guess I'm wary of the QC project because of the gargantuan cost and how it'll be paid for (property tax rises?).

I'm totally on board with the Father Bill debacle getting shut down.