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My wife and I are currently living and working in Manhattan (downtown).
Starting from September my wife will start to work in Tarrytown (I will keep working in downtown Manhattan - wall street) and we need to decide where to live.
We are a young couple in our early 30s and have a little kid, and the idea would be to move out of the city. We are worried that commuting on a daily bases from Tarrytown might be challenging. On top of that to find something close to the train station (to buy or to rent) that is not super expensive seams impossible.
Is anybody familiar with the area?
Any suggestions?
My wife and I are currently living and working in Manhattan (downtown).
Starting from September my wife will start to work in Tarrytown (I will keep working in downtown Manhattan - wall street) and we need to decide where to live.
We are a young couple in our early 30s and have a little kid, and the idea would be to move out of the city. We are worried that commuting on a daily bases from Tarrytown might be challenging. On top of that to find something close to the train station (to buy or to rent) that is not super expensive seams impossible.
Is anybody familiar with the area?
Any suggestions?
Thanks so much!
Your wife's commute will be simple from most of Westchester by car, assuming thats the ideal.
Lets stick to the river towns:
Hastings on Hudson, if you want to be halfway between with a quick commute to Manhattan. Good schools.
Irvington, if you have a bigger budget, and want a very easy commute for your wife, with a good commute to Manhattan and top notch schools.
Croton if you want the feel of Northern Westchester, good commute for wife, with a manageable but longer commute to NYC (about 48 min to GC by train)
Dobbs Ferry, less $ than Hastings and Irvington, a good commute to both, not sure about the schools, but I think they are good.
I have a buddy who worked in Tarrytown while is wife worked in the city. They moved to Ossining to have easy access to both, but then ended up moving to White Plains since they found themselves always going to White Plains for the shopping and dining. I guess for whatever reason, Ossining didn't work out for them.
How close do you want to be to Grand Central? How long of a commute is tolerable for your wife, by car?
Bronxville, Pelham, Larchmont, would work with a quick commute to Grand Central during rush hours, but that comes at a price. For example, you can be at Grand Central in about 30 minutes from Pelham, which shortens the time to get Downtown for you. For your wife, she would need to drive about 25-30 minutes to Tarrytown from Pelham on the New Haven Line. The Harlem Line is more central, so she would be closer to Tarrytown, but does not have as many express trains, which could be a factor, depending upon the station. You could buy in Pelham starting around ~$500k for a single-family home. Bronxville would be over $1M for a single-family home in the village, not the P.O. zone which includes parts of Yonkers around Sarah Lawrence, Mount Vernon (small part), and Eastchester, because you need to be in the village for the schools, despite it being part of the Town of Eastchester. Larchmont, you could find decent houses starting in the ~$700k range; however, there are a good number of co-ops and condos, such that you could find a 2BR starting in the higher $300k range. Irvington, Hastings, and Dobbs Ferry are similar, all are more expensive than Tarrytown proper.
Do you have a preferred lifestyle? Do you like the UES or UWS? If you like the UES, you might be more comfortable on the Sound Shore or the central portion of Westchester, whereas the River Towns in Westchester tend to have a vibe that is more similar to the UWS, except for Irvington that does still have an older money contingent that is very similar to Bronxville or Pelham Manor. Hastings is one of the more liberal River Towns as well, with a number of Brooklyn transplants being happy in that village, for example.
Tuckahoe, on the Harlem Line, would be a good consideration as well, since there is a train station in the village, and the schools are Eastchester, which are good as well. Prices are not as high as other surrounding communities with good schools. If you are open to a co-op, you could look at the Garth Road area, which is in the Town of Eastchester, but has a Scarsdale address, and is not far from the Scarsdale Metro-North station with express train access to Grand Central. A 2BR co-op would be in the $300k range, to start, in that neighborhood. I think that the longest walk to the station would be about 10 minutes, depending upon the building on Garth Road.
Riverdale is actually not a bad option, since your wife would be able to get directly on the Henry Hudson Parkway to the Saw Mill, about 25-30 minutes by car. You would still pay city resident income taxes, but there are numerous family apartments, condos, and co-ops, whereas there are villages and towns in Westchester with very few multi-family housing structures, that tends to keep prices higher. You could take Metro-North to Grand Central in about 25 minutes, and then transfer to the subway; or you could take the BxM18 express bus, which would take slightly longer, but is a single mode of transportation that some prefer.
Schools are competitive in Westchester, and people pay premiums in rent and purchase price, not to mention real estate taxes to fund the schools, with some public schools having excellent campus facilities and instruction. Some also pay premiums to be in the P.O. zone of a more expensive town, i.e., Bronxville, Scarsdale, Katonah, etc. when they actually live in another town and do not have the same schools or services. Dobbs Ferry does have good schools. Tarrytown's schools tend to be thought of as more "average" insofar as Westchester rankings, owing to mixed demographic groups that have effects on test scores, but are by no means inferior schools. Yonkers schools are a gamble because the city is under a federal desegregation order and the solution imposed was basically to make all city schools magnet schools, so while you may live in a nice, stable, family neighborhood, you may not be assigned to the local schools. Yonkers also has two outstanding schools, Pearls Hawthorne and Yonkers High which are both nationally ranked. Pearls Hawthorne requires passing an entrance examination, similar to that of a private school, and Yonkers High is IB curriculum only.
I would say that you should live as low in Westchester that is comfortably affordable for your preferred housing type, as it will shorten your commute. You wife will not have any difficulty driving from much of Lower Westchester. And, if you were to consider Riverdale, and she did not want to drive on a given day, she could take the Hudson Line train outbound to Tarrytown if her employer is near the train station or has a shuttle service, since many are on large campuses in that area. Check the train schedules, and it is always easier to live in a town/village with its own train station, especially if you need to drive to the station because parking is a commodity and many parking areas are administered by the town/village with residency required for a permit, or a substantially higher non-resident permit, and those are in short supply. Some train stations, such as Rye, have a years-long waiting list, even for residents, so the administration of parking, if not in walking distance, and not on a BeeLine bus route to the train station would need to be factored, and the bus to train option can be a hassle too.
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All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.
~William Shakespeare (As You Like It Act II, Scene VII)
OP, one of my coworkers commutes daily from Tarrytown. I think that it is an express, so it's fast and they say the Hudson Line has the best views. I know he pays MUCH less for parking at Tarrytown than I do at White Plains, and he says there is plenty of parking and finding a spot isn't an issue even though he goes to work late.
Personally, taking an express from White Plains daily is a breeze, and if Tarrytown is a similar commute then it is probably really easy too. The trick is making sure you catch an express - the local seems so slow and stop-and-go in comparison. I would much rather take an express from White Plains than live in a closer town and take a local.
We will have the same commute.
One works in Tarrytown and one works in Times Square.
Assuming we will have no car, where is the best location to live with the quickest commute. We will be renting and like to have walking distance to the train station.
No kids.
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