Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Wayland, Sudbury, Weston?

[Bettafish]

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

I live in Newton and I like it a lot. BUT, I like being (ideally) IN or if not in, then near a city. I like being able to walk places and having access to public transit (the past COVID year notwithstanding). When we moved up here, we looked at Lexington, but for my personal taste, I found it overpriced. It has no train, and getting downtown isn't as easy as I'd like. (I think in some cases, Concord can be an easier trip downtown with the train situation, even though it is further out.) Lexington seems overly impressed with itself based on its schools, and of course, the schools are indeed very good. By all the standard objective measures, they come out on top. But I find it hard to believe that they are truly appreciably better than the schools in any of the other towns you listed. Once you get to a certain point, any distinctions above that point are kind of meaningless. (Like arguing between which is "best" - Harvard, Stanford or Yale?) For me, Lexington's Town Center is very cute and very attractive, but if you don't live within walking distance, you have to drive most places, and in some cases, it seemed like for a five minute further drive, you may as well buy in Bedford for less money and schools that also rank very highly.

One third of Lexington residents are Asians, and many of them are immigrants with STEM MS/PhD degrees. The schools there will only be getting more and more competitive, and the parents can be very pushy, which may not be a good thing for some children.

I'm also looking in Bedford. The problem is, the inventory is very low there, and a few listings are out of my budget. The ones that are in my budget do not look good.

[maggs8888]

We had a similar list, with Acton and Westford also thrown into the mix since my husband worked in the Burlington area when we were looking. We ended up in Wayland after thorough consideration of all the things that truly mattered to us. Similar to Lexington academically but way less pressure-cooker environment. Kids who want to go Ivy will, but there are plenty who end up in the schools that are one notch down, and I rather have that for my kids if it means they still have time for a social life. Life is not all about academics - now that I've been working in Corporate America for 20+ years, the ones who rise to the Executive ranks are the ones who have strong people skills, and you don't learn those skills by studying all weekend. Good luck with you search.

[stuckbetween]

Thanks for the reminder, maggs8888! I think my studious peers and myself felt miffed for years that slacker social people were rising up the ranks of management. It’s great to have lots of academic knowledge as a safety net to know I’ll always be employable and able to learn new things, but your comment on executives is spot on.

[stuckbetween]

Congrats, OP! We were looking to move to Bedford (also from Los Angeles, have relative in Bedford) but there was NO acceptable inventory this summer in our price range. We instead bid on homes in Westford and Westborough - both more “affordable” due to distance from the city. We’re in Westborough now and settling in nicely. From what I know, Bedford schools are good and I’d send my kids there no problem. It’s so different to have all this space and quiet (and cold)! Welcome east, Angelenos! (Though, town natives are no so thrilled with folks like us moving back to MA).