Is 700k the new 300k? (Boston, Lexington: lawyer, best schools, college)

[msRB311]

I think there are plenty of places to live in MA where you can find a house for less than 700k. The problem is the school systems. It’s kind of sad that a family has to pay 700k or more to get the good schools. But people have it ingrained in their heads that their offspring deserve a top school and anything less is just not good enough. So no, I don’t foresee prices dropping much due to that.

[gf2020]

Originally Posted by brk330

I remember the retail and office parks although we never went into the actual town - as a teenager in the 80's we would drive there from Nashua on weekends- skateboard the empty office parks, cruise the mall, and loiter at Newbury Comics.

Pheasant Lane Mall in Nashua opened in 1986 - that saved you some driving!

The second floor of the Burlington Mall was added in 1988.

[CaseyB]

The Burlington Mall was built in the early to mid seventies, I think.

[Remy11]

Originally Posted by msRB311

I think there are plenty of places to live in MA where you can find a house for less than 700k. The problem is the school systems. It’s kind of sad that a family has to pay 700k or more to get the good schools. But people have it ingrained in their heads that their offspring deserve a top school and anything less is just not good enough. So no, I don’t foresee prices dropping much due to that.

Exactly. Anything commutable to Boston, considered desirable, and has a great school system will easily cost 700k-ish.

I laugh at the people who go bonkers over moving to a town “for the school system”, only to have their kid go to an average school that they could’ve gotten into if they lived in any random town. I wonder if people use the school system excuse to not sound uppity?

[CaseyB]

Don't you want to move to a town that matches your socionomic group more or less?

[CaseyB]

Originally Posted by CaseyB

The Burlington Mall was built in the early to mid seventies, I think.

Oops, found out it was 1968.

[msRB311]

Originally Posted by CaseyB

Don't you want to move to a town that matches your socionomic group more or less?

I think people tend to want the best that they can afford. Is that the same thing as wanting to be in your socioeconomic group ?

[Shizim]

Originally Posted by GeoffD

Winchester dropped ~ 20% from 1989 to 1993. 1993 is when I bought my house there. I presume the other blue chip suburbs were similar. Places like Woburn dropped much more.

I think what happened in 2008 would be a better more recent indicator. My recollection (I could be off) is towns like winchester, belmont, etc only saw low single digit price declines (<5%). Towns like Woburn saw double digit declines.

[johnh1212]

Originally Posted by msRB311

I think there are plenty of places to live in MA where you can find a house for less than 700k. The problem is the school systems. It’s kind of sad that a family has to pay 700k or more to get the good schools. But people have it ingrained in their heads that their offspring deserve a top school and anything less is just not good enough. So no, I don’t foresee prices dropping much due to that.

There are homes in Longmeadow that are less than 500K, for one of the best school systems in the state thats a pretty good deal.

[matrix5k]

Originally Posted by johnh1212

There are homes in Longmeadow that are less than 500K, for one of the best school systems in the state thats a pretty good deal.

I thought this thread was about the Boston area.