Antioch? (Murfreesboro, Franklin, Smyrna: to rent, new home, elementary school)

[rossc]

We don't live there but we drive through there a lot. I never considered that area to be dangerous in any way.

[vlwinfla]

OK, still on my search for a place, I plan to move at the end of this month!

Can someone give me some hard facts on ANTIOCH (email me if you don't want to post). I've seen a lot of negative things said about Antioch on this board (almost everything has been negative) .. but while searching for houses online, I've seem some homes in Antioch that look very nice and then I viewed the neighborhood on Google Street View and some of the neighborhoods look really nice with all nice homes on the street.

So what is the problem with Antioch? High crime? Are there good and bad areas? Gang infested?? Or is it "known" as a crime-ridden neighborhood? Any info to clarify this is greatly appreciated.

PS: School zones are not an issue for me as I have no school age children.

Thanks a million!!

[rossc]

Like any other place, it has good parts and bad parts. When you're house hunting and you come across an area that looks marginal, it probably is. For instance, the area near Anderson Rd and Priest Lake is very nice and the area near Hickory Hollow is not so nice. A quick drive through both areas will pretty much reveal this.

The problem in a nut shell is that people move to the wrong area then complain that the entire city or town is no good. This happens everywhere, not just Antioch. As a general rule, people with positive experiences tend not to be too vocal about them while people with negative experiences can't wait to tell the world.

[DonCorleone]

Exactly what rossc said. There are good parts of Antioch with well established neighborhoods and there are rough patches too.

I agree wholeheartedly with what rossc said about people having bad experiences and letting that shade their view on the rest of the area.

If you're single or married with no kids, then I'd give it a cautious look. But if you have kids, I'd look elsewhere just because public schools are better in other counties or parts of Nashville

[Antioch]

Where is the house in Antioch? Antioch is very large land wise and popluation and you have Antioch, and the Antioch area, the outskirts, which makes it even larger. Antioch has a very strong supportive community and is working very hard to confront and rebuild the negative image portayed by the media in the past years. Antioch is not a bad place at all, no worse than any other Nashville suburb, it just happens to have more blacks, hispanics, whites, and other races living in the area and for many in Nasville that is always a negative. The community leaders hold town hall meetings often to keep the community with what is going on with the area and to plan new things for the area. The Hickory Hollow area is not a bad area, it had some problems in the mall around 2006, but they where isolated problems, due to concerts at that where held in the mall's center court by a particular store that is no longer there, that would attract teens from all over nashville, which became a problem. That store was also famous for having Tennessee Titan players and local rappers come hang out, so again attracting nearly every teen in Nashville. The store did not control its crowd it was attacting, again teens from all over nashville. The news never fully reported what really went on so it left people to think it was just so so dangerous in a dangerous part of town. Fastforward to to day, 2 major anchors of the mall are no longer there so with them gone it makes it much harder for the other stores to survive, stores close and makes the rent higher and higher for remaining ones, which is the reason behind stores closing at Hickory Hollow, not because of crime. However, there have been new stores open in the mall within the past year or so. There is a fitness center for women located on the Macys wing, a girls mentoring program that meets there on the weekends and a boys choir that meets there as well. There will also be a carribean style resturant opening in the food court soon as well as a cup cake shop. coming as well. The mall area is also undergoing a revitilization. The McDonalds across the street from the mall was recently rebuilt and converted to a very modern, sit down restruant type, resturant. The Burger King was also redesigned last year. The Taco Bell and KFC are also very modern. There is a new resturant that opened in the old Out Back building named Snapstones, or something like that. I heard it is very similar to Cheedars, but better. There are also plans of putting side walks on both sides of Bell Rd. and trees. Work on that has already began. There is also talk of Nashivlle State having a satelite campus in the old Dillards building, hope that happens. The Antioch community refuses to let the area go to the dogs, that just won't happen. As mentioned before, there are problems in every area, however, Antioch is no where near as bad as people make it out to be, not even almost close to being bad like some other areas of town that are dangerous. Just to note, when I say Antioch, I am talking about areas primarly east of 1-24. 37013 and 37217 zips not the Harding place/Nolensville Rd. West Haywood lane areas, or 37211 zip. Those areas are represented by different metro cousil members who do not meet with residents of Antioch about issues in Antioch, but are often times associated with Antioch. Completley different school zones, racial make up, and economics.

[Antioch]

Originally Posted by DonCorleone

Exactly what rossc said. There are good parts of Antioch with well established neighborhoods and there are rough patches too.

I agree wholeheartedly with what rossc said about people having bad experiences and letting that shade their view on the rest of the area.

If you're single or married with no kids, then I'd give it a cautious look. But if you have kids, I'd look elsewhere just because public schools are better in other counties or parts of Nashville

The schools in Antioch are not bad. Cane Ridge high school, has made Annual Yearly Progress, in good status, the 3 years it has been open. Evey metro High School has been on the watch list at some point...several middle schols as well. Antioch High has not quite made it, but is on the improving list. The middle schools are very similar to middle schools in other areas of the county. The elementaries are actually better than many of the Nashville elementaries. That is if you are in the Antioch school zones, 37211 are zoned for Overton and Glencliff schools, 37013, which is Antioch, and 37217, Priest Lake area, are zoned for Antioch and Cane Ridge cluster schools.
I would not hesitate to send my child to an Antioch area school.

[DonCorleone]

Originally Posted by Antioch

The schools in Antioch are not bad. Cane Ridge high school, has made Annual Yearly Progress, in good status, the 3 years it has been open. Evey metro High School has been on the watch list at some point...several middle schols as well. Antioch High has not quite made it, but is on the improving list. The middle schools are very similar to middle schools in other areas of the county. The elementaries are actually better than many of the Nashville elementaries. That is if you are in the Antioch school zones, 37211 are zoned for Overton and Glencliff schools, 37013, which is Antioch, and 37217, Priest Lake area, are zoned for Antioch and Cane Ridge cluster schools.
I would not hesitate to send my child to an Antioch area school.

That is my point. If education is a concern, then I would look to another county before Metro. Or if you must live in Metro, then cherry pick the best school possible.

[Mayor_McCheese]

Used to be so nice. I lived in Priest Lake/Antioch for over 20 years. Around 1999 we moved to Franklin. The Antioch area was already going down hill fast by the time we left. Now I can sum up the area in one word: Ghetto

I would look in Hermitage, Smyrna, Franklin, Brentwood

[Alek37205]

I do not know much about Antioch, but I heard it's becoming ghetto.

If you are interested in buying a home in an area not too far from the city, check out booming subdivisions in Pegram and Kingston Springs that are easily accessible from I-40 about 15 to 20 miles west of Nashville.

If you want luxury homes, look into Forest Hill, Belle Meade, Heritage, Smyra, Brentwood, and Franklin.

[nashvols]

Originally Posted by Mayor_McCheese

Used to be so nice. I lived in Priest Lake/Antioch for over 20 years. Around 1999 we moved to Franklin. The Antioch area was already going down hill fast by the time we left. Now I can sum up the area in one word: Ghetto

I would look in Hermitage, Smyrna, Franklin, Brentwood

To call Antioch a ghetto, yet include Hermitage, Smyrna, Franklin and Brentwood in the same sentence is quite odd.

Hickory Hollow is bad, as are some other stretches of Antioch...but to paint the whole area with a broad brush is downright ignorant and uniformed. There are certainly areas of Antioch I would live in over certain areas of Hermitage and Smyrna. Heck, there are even small pockets of Franklin that are trashy and ghettoish.

In my experience, people who make statements like yours have only driven through a small section of a place, and make a broad judgment off of a small portion that they have seen.