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Old 03-08-2014, 07:54 AM
 
Location: under the beautiful Carolina blue
22,623 posts, read 36,573,204 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by meh_whatever View Post
If I was from Davis, I'd rather move there. Pay is higher. Budget should be higher for house, no?

ETA: I realize it'll still mean a smaller home out there, but cheap housing is hardly a good reason to move to a place you know almost zero about.
You literally need to pay in the millions to get a house that will hold seven people AND get good schools. I have a friend that lives in NorCal, in one of the best districts, I doubt there is a house under $2 million there. Cali schools are notoriously underfunded, no busing at all and if the area isn't wealthy with a TON of fundraising there are NO extras. If I had special ed kids NorCal would be very low on my list of relocation areas.

Since the OP is from that area I'm sure she knows all this and that's what it's not on the radar.
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Old 03-08-2014, 07:56 AM
 
Location: My House
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Quote:
Originally Posted by GotHereQuickAsICould View Post
Hadn't realized Chapel Hill was so far from RTP. Good to know.

But I agree on the schools. If housing cost/property taxes were not a factor, I suspect most folks would prefer to have their kids in Chapel Hills schools.
I'd love CH schools if they weren't in CH.

I like visiting CH, but it has never felt like a place I'd really want to live.
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Old 03-08-2014, 08:01 AM
 
Location: My House
34,937 posts, read 36,102,039 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by twingles View Post
You literally need to pay in the millions to get a house that will hold seven people AND get good schools. I have a friend that lives in NorCal, in one of the best districts, I doubt there is a house under $2 million there. Cali schools are notoriously underfunded, no busing at all and if the area isn't wealthy with a TON of fundraising there are NO extras. If I had special ed kids NorCal would be very low on my list of relocation areas.

Since the OP is from that area I'm sure she knows all this and that's what it's not on the radar.
Ahhhh. The schools thing would make me not want to be there. Thanks, twingles. I was genuinely curious.

We look in the San Jose area now and then (husband works for Cisco), so while I think housing is pricey, I am a little more familiar with that aspect. Something I didn't think of was how our price range translated a bit easier into a nice home in a nice area. I hadn't thought of how quickly that might decline as budgets got lower.

It all makes more sense now.
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Old 03-08-2014, 09:21 AM
 
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We were transferred to MN for my husbands job. Davis is in central California, about 100 miles north of th Bay Area. It is more rural and less expensive to live. The school district was one of the strongest in California, but schools are not great in CA compared to elsewhere. The food and weather is great, but the traffic and cost of living are terrible. My husband and I really do not want to go back to CA. I stay home with the kids and where we were able to squeak by, our home was 700k and we only had 3 kids at the time. We now have 5 kids and no desire to squash ourselves in. The politics are kind of crazy in CA as well, and the taxes are super high. I would rather stay here in the freezing cold then try to force ourselves back. I know that sounds odd, but my husband would probably have to work longer hours then he does now for us to make ends meet and it is not worth it. He already works 12 hour days and travels for work.
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Old 03-08-2014, 09:26 AM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by meh_whatever View Post
If I was from Davis, I'd rather move there. Pay is higher. Budget should be higher for house, no?

ETA: I realize it'll still mean a smaller home out there, but cheap housing is hardly a good reason to move to a place you know almost zero about.
The pay is not higher in Davis - the company he worked for closed it's Davis site and that was the only tech job for an hours drive from where we were. His salary was the same here as it was there. If we went to the Bay Area, he would make about 15k more then he does here. Our home here is 500k, thre it wold be 1.2 million dollars. I loved Davis, but we have to go where the jobs are and I had to face it years ago that the jobs are not there. Yes, I do not know much about the triangle area, but I am trying to learn.
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Old 03-08-2014, 09:29 AM
 
56 posts, read 93,005 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by GotHereQuickAsICould View Post
If I had five kids, several on IEPs, and I could afford a $400+K home, I'd be looking at Chapel Hill.

Talked to an OT a few months ago who said when she worked in Raleigh, she had so many on her caseload that all she had time for was assessments for IEPs and consulting with teachers and aides, very little time for one-on-one work with individual students. In Chapel Hill, she had a manageable caseload of students that she worked with on a weekly basis in addition to assessments for IEPs and consulting with teachers.

Second on my list would be Cary. Still Wake county school system, and no sure of the quality of SpEd services, but many move to Cary because of the schools. You'll get a little more house for your money, but lots of parks and parks and rec programs. Cary works hard to be supportive of quality of life issues.

Cary would be a longer commute to RTP than Chapel Hill, but many do it.
How long of a commute is it to the triangle area from Cary? My husband would be okay with toll roads.

Also, I do not remember the schools ranking as high on Great Schools in Chapel Hill as they did in Cary, yet everyone rises about the schools in Chapel Hill. Any idea why? It is super hard to evaluate a school system from far away and I am using the only tools I have available to me. I know that using Great Schools is a little flawed.
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Old 03-08-2014, 09:35 AM
 
56 posts, read 93,005 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by twingles View Post
You literally need to pay in the millions to get a house that will hold seven people AND get good schools. I have a friend that lives in NorCal, in one of the best districts, I doubt there is a house under $2 million there. Cali schools are notoriously underfunded, no busing at all and if the area isn't wealthy with a TON of fundraising there are NO extras. If I had special ed kids NorCal would be very low on my list of relocation areas.

Since the OP is from that area I'm sure she knows all this and that's what it's not on the radar.
Thank you for your resonce! You are right in every way with your post. I am looking elsewhere because CA us not a right fit and I know it well enough to know that. I wood stay in MN if the winters were not so long and hard. We are all stuck inside and my kids need to get outside. We go out when we can, but to winter has been really rough. We have had 50 plus days that were below zero, many of those being -20 with wind chills knocking it down to -40. There is no way to go out and deal with that so we are looking elsewhere. I wish we cold go back to CA, but we can't for the reasons you posted.
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Old 03-08-2014, 09:37 AM
 
56 posts, read 93,005 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Gard View Post
To answer a couple of your questions...

#1. No and they are unlikely to settle down anytime soon. Schools continue to be built like mad to try and keep pace with growth.

#3. Public lake beaches are practically non-existent, as are lakes for that matter. Most "lakes" here are man made and run by the Army Corps of Engineers as reservoirs.
Has the bussing situation settled down a bit?
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Old 03-08-2014, 10:50 AM
 
Location: Carpenter Village, Cary
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We live in western Cary and there are a TON of tech jobs within 15 minutes. Schools can be a case-by-case situation. Carpenter Elementary did not help my son (high functioning Asperger's) one bit. It got pretty bad. Highcroft Drive, however, has been fabulous. They really seem to understand the twice-exceptional child who has an IEP, but at the same time easily qualifies for the gifted program. I found Highcroft by looking for a school that had an autism program for K-2 grade. Even though my son started there in third grade, I figured the culture and resources of the school would be different and that has definitely worked out.

As for being able to walk to parks and such, that can go by neighborhood too. We have paths and parks and a large library within walking distance. You can fish and take small boats and kayaks and such out on our neighborhood lake, but you really don't want to swim in it. Cary and Apex are the land of the minivan and there is a lot to do with and for your kids.
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Old 03-08-2014, 11:07 AM
 
51,580 posts, read 25,554,304 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CVAlicia View Post

As for being able to walk to parks and such, that can go by neighborhood too. We have paths and parks and a large library within walking distance. You can fish and take small boats and kayaks and such out on our neighborhood lake, but you really don't want to swim in it. Cary and Apex are the land of the minivan and there is a lot to do with and for your kids.
Land of the minivan and the Prius.

HOA's with pools, swim teams, parks, walking trails... Lot of folks make fun of Cary because the town goes to great effort to plan things out. Lots of pocket parks, parks and rec programs, walking trails...

Currently, the push from city planners is "walkable urban." They've identified three areas that will likely be be developed as centers for restaurants, shops, grocery stores, etc. and have started by developing downtown. Over the years, the town has gathered up about 14 acres in the downtown area. Though the original talk was that this would be a destination park, turns out it will be mostly a boutique hotel, theater, restaurants, coffee shops, with a green space in the center.

It seems to me that though the town was developed as a family suburban community for IBM employees, it is now moving in the direction of attracting professionals who want to walk home after a night out. But there are acres and acres of homes on large lots, so you I doubt the family thing will wane any time soon.

I don't know much about Chapel Hill. UNC and college students and grand old homes is my impression.
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