Going to New York, where shall I live please??

[giddybiddy]

Until last week it was going to be Asia, but yesterday DH announced that we will be relocating to New York next year instead and I would really welcome some advice about where to live and start looking for schools.

DH has job in New York City and I will be at home with the three girls, who are going to be 11, 9 and 4. I therefore want to live someone that is family friendly and where there will be other stay at home mums. Good schools is also really important, I am not sure yet whether they will be public or private, am waiting to hear from the company.

DH is keen to keep his commute under an hour..... I wouldn?t mind being in an apartment in the city, but am a bit worried that most of the mums would be working so maybe better to head further out...

Any advice would be really welcome! Many thanks.

Many thanks.

Congrats on the move. Couple of things to consider:

1 - If you live in an apartment in NYC you will have no outdoor space. In summer most families head to the shore - either the Hamptons, Jersey Shore or Cape Cod area. Also, 4 bed family apartments with a parking spot are not easy to find. You also have to check the lifts. We lived in a tall building as young kids and the 30min wait for a lift would kill us.

2 - A commute less than an hour with good schools. I would look at Millburn/Basking Ridge/ Berkeley Heights/New Providence/Chatham, NJ and Greenwich/Westport/Wilton and the small towns inbetween. I live in NJ in a town near Millburn. I can confirm Millburn has fantastic schools and very few people living there go private. Zillow.com is a great place to check out house prices and you can see where houses have been selling at. I grew up between the UK and Greenwich, CT. My parents went private after they started bussing kids in from rough parts of Stamford. I don't know if things have changed but the guys who I worked with who lived in CT all had their kids in private schools.

3 - For your sanity I would think suburbs are a better place. More mothers are not working in these areas as the cost of living is less. There also tends to be more activities offered for children.

If you are planning on a two year relocation there is a British school in New York now. I don't think they are doing secondary level but they do cover the early years. If you are planning on returning to the UK after a short stint it is worth sticking to the British education system. For a longer move you have nothing to worry about with the good schools here in the US. This a good place to start doing research - www.greatschools.org/

Hi, that is so kind. I will start to check out those areas. The secondment will be 3 years to begin with and then who knows.

Is the US education system very different to the UK one? If I could find an IB school maybe that would be a solution....

Many thanks indeed.

The issue will be greatest for you elder two. I would not worry too much about your 4 year old.

I know the town I live in is talking about introducing the IB program to our local high school. Hoboken High school offers the program but I wouldn't send a dog to that school. DH lived opposite that school and we some questionable activities going on. I would also avoid school in Jersey City and Newark. McNair is a great school but it is almost impossible to get into.

This page allows you to search for schools in different states that offer the IB program. From that list I would take a look at Mendham first. Your DH would take the train from morristown and it is a good place to live. I would also call Millburn High School and speak to someone there. There are lots of families from the UK who live around here and the school will know which direction to point you in.

My BIL and SIL live in Rye, Westchester County. It is right next to the sea and about a 40 minute commute into Grand Central Station.
They went there in 2005 supposedly for 2 years and are still there now.
They rented a house for a couple of years and then bought a house that backs onto the marina.
Their children (9 & 7) are at the local state primary school and their parents seem very happy with it. The high school is just down the road and I believe it is highly regarded, it certainly looks like a nice school from the outside.
We have stayed with them twice and think it is a lovely place to live.
There is even a funfair in the town and a large open air swimming pool just minutes drive away, although I think you have to be a member to get in (don't think its megabucks though). It is only open for 4 - 5 months of the year though and closes at the beginning of September. It was always a nice place to go on a very hot New York summer day with our teenagers and their little cousins (and boy does it get hot there in the summer). Get a house with aircon.
There is an ex pat community there and this is where my SIL met her earliest friends through just seeing about it in a local magazine. She has been a stay at home mum since they have been there and seems to have plenty to do with her time, either helping at school, helping run a brownie pack, organising charity stuff, seeing friends and doing the Rye Triathlon twice!

Greenwich Ct (or Riverside, Old Greenwich). Its a 40-45 mins commute to grand central and the public (state) schools are some of the top in the whole country even when pitted agains private. Its family friendly and there is a beach open year round. I lived there from 11-16 for similar reasons and would say its still an ideal place.

Hi, this is all so helpful, many thanks.

Will start researching. Please keep anything else that might be useful coming!!

Thanks so much,

Hi Giddy
I could have written your message myself a few weeks ago!
We are relocating to NY in January and finding the right place to live has been tricky. My husband's office is in Manhattan and he wanted a short commute, I wanted to live somewhere with a nice community feel and good schools - after hours of research with the train schedule, map and greatschools.org we have chosen Pelham in Westchester county.

This is a 30 min train journey from Grand Central. We chose Westchester mainly because a lot of the public schools out-perform the private ones so we can send our two girls (8 and 6) to the local school which has excellent results, class sizes are also smaller than in a UK state school. I did briefly look at the British school, if we go back in two years I don't want the girls to be out of synch too much but the company were unwilling to fund this and it was way more than the private fees we pay for their current school.

I went over for a few days last week to look at houses and schools - we will rent probably for a couple of years to see if we want to stay longer. Pelham is a really lovely village/small town it is so close to the city yet feels like a different world! There are four elementary schools, one middle and one high school. Three of the elementary schools are rated 10/10 on the schools site and have results in the 80s and 90s in their assessments (greatschools.org has all of these results, class sizes, etc for every school).
It is right next to the Long Island Sound, there are a couple of clubs with leisure facilities and it is right next to New Rochelle which is more of a city and has more amenities. We have friends who live in Larchmont which is also very nice, it is a couple of stops up from Pelham on the train line. They love it there and we would have looked there but there wasn't anything available to rent when we were looking.

I'm not sure what you already know about the school system there but it is run on a strict catchment area basis - they have to accept your child if you live within the catchment area and if you move out of it your child has to change schools. In our case we have had to find somewhere that we would be happy to buy a house eventually before looking at any rentals otherwise it could mean a change of schools after a couple of years or continue renting indefinitely and neither of those options appealed to us.

If you want to know anything else about Pelham or just compare notes on moving issues then let me know. Are you happy to be coming to NY instead of Asia? We did 6 years in HK and loved it, a very different expat experience to NY I think!

Thank you, that is great. I can imagine it took you hours, I have already spent a great deal of time on that school website!! Pelham sounds a good idea, though as you say seems to depend on whether the company will fund schools or not. That is interesting about the strict catchment area, I didn't know that you were guaranteed a place in school if you are in the right area. I guess that pushes rental prices right up in those areas though....

Anyway, thanks again for your help. much appreciated.

One other thing. If your husbands office is on the East side of Manhattan it is better to live in a town which has a train going into Grand Central (this would a train coming in from CT or Westchester - Metro North lines). If his office is on the West side then New Jersey or Long Island are a better bet (NJ Path and LIRR). My company has their office on the West side which is why we are in New Jersey.

You should also consider property and state taxes. When I worked up in Stamford it was cheaper for me to live in Greenwich, CT than Harrison, Westchester because of the taxes. I saved around $5k a year and I lived in a nicer area.

Further on CFB - Each town collects proterty taxes which fund education, safety (fire/police/ambulance) and other activities. When researching our area we found out that the town pool is $30 for the summer season and the community center offers heavily discounted kiddie programs (you name it and they offer it in our town) to those who live in town. It is these activities which make the transition easier for everyone. Some towns have very limited community involvement which makes it a little bit more difficult when coordinating after school activities for three children.

No matter where you live you will need a car. The roads here are not great and I made the mistake of not getting a 4x4. I strongly suggest you only consider 4 wheeled drive cars. My 2 wheel drive golf is like bambi on ice in winter and even with a 1.6 liter engine it can stuggle to get up some hills. I would also avoid low profile tires. DH has them and they blow out every 9 months on average because of the bumps in the road. There are a lot of non SUV type 4x4 cars to choose from. As you are arriving at the start of snow season (tends to fall mid jan-mid march) get a plastic edge snow shovel, a huge bag of salt with grit in it and if you have a driveway get down to sears and buy a snow blower with a service package. Once the snow arrives everything sells out (we got caught out and then got a $60 ticket from the town for not putting salt and grit down).

We don't have aircon but our house was built years ago and has a huge fan in the roof to draw heat out of the house. If you are looking at a house built after 1945 make sure it has central air. These homes need it!

Ah, now that is something I hadn't thought of, I will get the details of the office address. Thanks, also good point about a 4x4, am fairly used to the snow as we're in Switzerland at the moment!!

If his office is downtown (ie battery park/ world trade center area) it is easiest to take the train into Hoboken and then the path train to WTC in winter or the ferry in summer.

This is such a useful thread, I have just found out I may be moving to NYC for dh's job, but only for a year & our boys are only 2 & 4 months.

Did you come across any family friendly bits of Manhatten that would have been ok if schools weren't a consideration?

Giddy- My DC's are much younger than yours, and we are moving to Manhattan sometime around May/ June. I researched schools before finding out that they would actually be still in preschool next year because of the American School system. . I started a thread in this topic - NY Schools, and if you find it has the list of schools I looked at. We are not looking around them when we visit in Feb, as thats for next year but I have heard very good things about Spence from a Mum there, its all girls and on the UES. Have you definitely decided to live in the suburbs?

cityangel. If you are here a year I would consider UWS/UES, Brooklyn Heights/Park Slope or Hoboken, NJ. They all have very good kiddie facilities in a city environment. Your 2yr old would probably LOVE the museums on the UWS.

For preschool I have heard very good things about Bright Horizons. They have locations in Manhattan and in Hoboken. If we lived in Hoboken/Manhattan it is where we would send our children.

I think we are decided on the Greenwich area after looking into various school options and rental costs. We're off to have a look later this month to see if that will work out. Thanks so much for everyone's advice.

Thank you all for your great messages. I am absolutely gutted as the move is now off :( Dh spoke to his boss yesterday afternoon as we were keen to make sure it was the best move for his career & the discussions resulted in a 'no'. Dh had previously seemed so sure.

I was getting seriously excited. Still we have only just moved to North London so I will go back to trying to find friends for ds here. I hope you all enjoy your time in the Big Apple.

I know this discussion started a while back but just wondering if anyone can tell me what it would cost to rent a 2 bed place in:

1. Manhattan
2. Hoboken/Brooklyn Heights
3. Greenwich CT

DH and I are just researching a potential move out there later this year with our 1 year old DS and need to work out whether the money offered will allow us to live have a decent lifestyle in the city or whether a move a bit further out would be best.

I am staying at home with DS, and DH job will be near(ish) Grand Central. Any advice would be much appreciated!

Thanks!

Best to look on craigslist. I would not consider anything without a parking spot in Hoboken, Brooklyn Heights or Greenwich CT.

Expect to pay around $2500-3000 for a nice place in Hoboken (will have balcony and good facilities in the building) or in Brooklyn Heights, $3500+ for Manhattan (will be small with few facilities) and $3000-ish for Greenwich, CT just off the Ave (will have limited facilities).

If you like Hoboken I would suggest you look at the Shipyard. It is uptown in Hoboken, they have a fitness room, parking and swimming pool on the roof. The rents are pretty good for the facilities provided.