Building new home: Dulles corridor vs PW 66 area (McLean, Springfield: student loan, townhouse)

[gammann]

Originally Posted by tysonsengineer

I originally asked for a transfer to work in Fairfax, company forced me to work in the PWC branch because, ya know, as the lowest person on the totem pole nobody else was willing to work there.

But how could you, that goes against every thing you stand for....robbing the money from one county and all. You should have held to your ideology and quit. I mean how could your company make you work in an inferior county?

[stpickrell]

Originally Posted by gammann

But how could you, that goes against every thing you stand for....robbing the money from one county and all. You should have held to your ideology and quit. I mean how could your company make you work in an inferior county?

I think he's just jelly that Loudoun's got the highest household income and all.

[newnewsmama]

I lived in both PW (Gainesville/Bristow area), and Loudoun. I like Loudoun a lot better. If you want to commute to Mclean, try Cascades in Sterling or Ashburn. Traffic in Ashburn is not very good. But you can take the bus to Tysons. The Greenway will help if you are willing to pay the expensive toll.

[JD984]

If you want a short commute, you can find a nice older home in Annandale (22003) near the Beltway. If you want newer construction, of the places you mentioned, I'd stick to Ashburn - maybe the Brambleton area - and try to avoid some place in PW where you might have to take Route 66 and then potentially have to spend additional time on Route 123 or Route 7. Commuting to Tysons from Ashburn isn't easy, but you have more options.

Traffic is a bear in NoVa, and you have to decide how long a commute you're ready to accept, and for how long. There are quite a few of us on this forum who've moved to reduce our commutes, but we don't speak for everyone, and people have different priorities.

[tysonsengineer]

Originally Posted by stpickrell

I think he's just jelly that Loudoun's got the highest household income and all.

Clearly you don't know what the meaning of median income is. Also I love you loudouners make both the argument that you can't afford fairfax and that Loudoun has more money.

[sonnymarkjiz]

Originally Posted by newnewsmama

I lived in both PW (Gainesville/Bristow area), and Loudoun. I like Loudoun a lot better. If you want to commute to Mclean, try Cascades in Sterling or Ashburn. Traffic in Ashburn is not very good. But you can take the bus to Tysons. The Greenway will help if you are willing to pay the expensive toll.

I live in Brambleton (south Ashburn) and work in Tysons. From wax pool-28s-toll road, I can be at work in 30 mins. 40 if wax pool is backed up around 7:30-8:30. If 30 mins is a long time to you, then weird, especially for nova. But if so, I feel like the bus from ashburn to Tyson's is a bit much.
(it's 18.9 miles from my house to my office in Tyson's)

I used to live in dumfries and commute to Tyson's daily.(35 miles from dumfries to Tyson's). THAT was a drive. It'd take 90 mins on a good day to get from dumfries to Tysons one way. To me, 30 mins one way is doable.

[newnewsmama]

Originally Posted by sonnymarkjiz

I live in Brambleton (south Ashburn) and work in Tysons. From wax pool-28s-toll road, I can be at work in 30 mins. 40 if wax pool is backed up around 7:30-8:30. If 30 mins is a long time to you, then weird, especially for nova. But if so, I feel like the bus from ashburn to Tyson's is a bit much.
(it's 18.9 miles from my house to my office in Tyson's)

I used to live in dumfries and commute to Tyson's daily.(35 miles from dumfries to Tyson's). THAT was a drive. It'd take 90 mins on a good day to get from dumfries to Tysons one way. To me, 30 mins one way is doable.

When I said Ashburn's traffic was not good. I was not comparing it with PW. PW's commute to Tyson's is much worse. That's why I recommended Loudoun over PW to the OP. Waxpool is often backed up because very few people want to pay the toll on Greenway. It is pretty bad at rush hours.

[NYmama2dallas]

Originally Posted by sonnymarkjiz

I live in Brambleton (south Ashburn) and work in Tysons. From wax pool-28s-toll road, I can be at work in 30 mins. 40 if wax pool is backed up around 7:30-8:30. If 30 mins is a long time to you, then weird, especially for nova. But if so, I feel like the bus from ashburn to Tyson's is a bit much.
(it's 18.9 miles from my house to my office in Tyson's)

I used to live in dumfries and commute to Tyson's daily.(35 miles from dumfries to Tyson's). THAT was a drive. It'd take 90 mins on a good day to get from dumfries to Tysons one way. To me, 30 mins one way is doable.

So you are saying it takes you 30-40 minutes from the intersection at waxpool/28 to tysons. That is not a 30-40 minute commute, total, right? You have to get from your house to that intersection. Unless you live at Wegmans.
I am surprised that distance is only 30-40 minutes at the peak of rush hour.

OP, I would never commute from so far out to Tysons every day, esp with two young children. If I was commuting to Tysons and had a 600k budget, I would look in the nicer areas of Annandale, Reston, Fairfax City, and Vienna. You can get a nice house with plenty of space for 4 people in a great school district without a soul-crushing commute.

[sonnymarkjiz]

Originally Posted by NYmama2dallas

So you are saying it takes you 30-40 minutes from the intersection at waxpool/28 to tysons. That is not a 30-40 minute commute, total, right? You have to get from your house to that intersection. Unless you live at Wegmans.
I am surprised that distance is only 30-40 minutes at the peak of rush hour.

OP, I would never commute from so far out to Tysons every day, esp with two young children. If I was commuting to Tysons and had a 600k budget, I would look in the nicer areas of Annandale, Reston, Fairfax City, and Vienna. You can get a nice house with plenty of space for 4 people in a great school district without a soul-crushing commute.

I mean leaving on a GOOD day leaving from my house, yes 30 mins or so, not on a day with heavy traffic. On a good day, 30 mins is easily doable. Of course, traffic makes a difference. It's not backed up on waxpool every single day.


If it takes someone more than 45 mins to get into Tysons from ashburn, either there's a bad accident somewhere, traffic is awful everywhere, or you just drive like a granny. The longest it took me to get to work was an hour one morning when there was not one but two accidents on the DTR.

[tryingtogetahead]

what kind of job do i need to afford a 600 - 750k home in fairfax? i am really amazed at how expensive things are. i make 120k as an engineer and am looking to 'move up' in the next few years. what do i need to be doing? what am i doing wrong? what am i missing?

can someone fill me in as to how much money i really need to be making to live in a nice home, drive 2 nice cars and raise 2-3 children?

thank you all in advance for your replies.