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Thanks to all for this wonderful forum. I'm learning a lot reading the postings.
We (me, husband, 3y/o kid) are moving to the Triangle area in (gulp) January. I've taken a new job at UNC. My husband is self-employed, and has some flexibility about where he situates his new office.
We will rent to start. We don't know the area at all, have very little time to scope things out, and have to sell our house out-of-state anyway. I've been using Craigslist, Zillow, Trulia, and a local realtor's site to scout for single-family rentals. Down the line, we would likely buy outside of CH-proper, for the lower housing costs. We will have a 3 or 4 day trip there in mid-December to look at housing and preschools.
I'll be working a standard workday at UNC. It is important to us to keep everyone's commute time down as much as possible. We want a or very ready access to park/playground for the kiddo. I'd prefer detached, but we could make a townhome work. At this moment, our best bet on a pre-school situation for kiddo happens to be in what looks like SW Durham.
I'd sort of gotten it in my head that all of this automatically means Durham, but now I'm wondering if I've unnecessarily cut other places from consideration.
Am I wrong or should I focus on Durham? I don't have the time to consider every bit of the area in depth, but I don't want to overlook great options either.
I don't have info on rentals, but if you're looking for areas that could provide a reasonable (short) commute to UNC, in addition to SW Durham you could consider northern Chatham county (south of Chapel Hill, between CH and Pittsboro) or Orange County north and/or west of Chapel Hill - including the Hillsborough area.
If you're planning on having your child in public schools in the near future you should consider staying in the Chapel Hill/Carrboro school district. It's generally considered the best school district in the state and offers dual language programs in Spanish and Mandarin starting in K. Check out ReDir . Do be aware that areas in Chatham county and Durham county have Chapel Hill addresses, but are not in the Chapel Hill Carrboro City Schools district. It is not a county wide system unlike Durham, Chatham, and Wake. Orange County has its own system that is pretty good, but not CHCCS.
There are plenty of fairly affordable homes in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. It has a reputation of everything being expensive and that's just not the case across the board. You can buy a single family detached home for under $200 in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. There are many that are in the $200s. Of course you can drop a million if you've got it lying around, too. The housing costs are higher than in Durham or Chatham county, but that's because the schools are that much better.
Out of curiosity have you thought about putting the kiddo in the University's Child Care Center near the Friday Center? They handle infants through 5 year olds and being able to drop your child off on the way into work might open up more housing options for you!
There are plenty of fairly affordable homes in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. It has a reputation of everything being expensive and that's just not the case across the board. You can buy a single family detached home for under $200 in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. There are many that are in the $200s. Of course you can drop a million if you've got it lying around, too. The housing costs are higher than in Durham or Chatham county, but that's because the schools are that much better.
Do you have a price point in mind?
At least in part, that would depend on the sale of our out-of-state house! The 200k ballpark isn't far off the mark though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by garnetpalmetto
Out of curiosity have you thought about putting the kiddo in the University's Child Care Center near the Friday Center? They handle infants through 5 year olds and being able to drop your child off on the way into work might open up more housing options for you!
Thanks for the reminder! I'll look into that too.
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