would you give up a rental house with an amazing view for a view of a petrol station for an amazing school versus mediocre one?

[KierkegaardGroupie]

OK so by the end of today we need to decide- do we leave our lovely spacious 1250 sq foot mid century hillside home with incredible views of a wooded canyon in very peaceful area- it is up 40 steps though which is not fun with two under 5's- to move to a smaller, less inspiring 1000 sq foot 1930s house in an amazing neighbourhood but the house looks into a petrol station at the front.Is there anything we should know about petrol stations- like are they maybe harmful healthwise.We rent now and do not want to buy....we will never afford to buy in the area we are considering as most homes close to the million dollar mark minimum.So we would be renting in an area we could never ever afford.

The house we are considering is about 20% more in rent than we pay now..like 350 quid more a month but it gets us into an amazing primary so no need for private school if we could have stretched to that.....

It does have a grass garden and driveway rather than a concrete yard wehave now...no steps and in an amazing area- let's say the equivalent of Kensington in London versus where we are now....more like Raynes Park.....

Just trying to decide is losing space and total aesthetic pleasure in your home worth it to be in the kind of smallest "worst' house on the best street in a very desirable area that most importantly has the best schools in the city- we are in a major expensive city in the US....with some very bad schools in many areas...our local school is on the up but our son would be one of the few English speakers on the playground which makes me a little sad somehow...the whole fitting in and socialising aspect so important when you are a kid.

So just canvassing opinions.....what would you do and why?The gas station is so kind of undesirable opposite the house..... but it is a very clean and kind of upmarket one and from the back of the house you are not aware of it at all...maybe i put blinds up to block it out...it is open till 10 every night- also near the main throughfare for the area so busy road maybe 50 metres from the house....just trying to brain crunch it out...as may sign lease later today.So hard to give up the most amazing view I have ever had....but thinking the kids having a good school experience is more important.
Thank you in advance;))

If you are renting, you could try it out for a couple of years, get your dc onto the excellent school and then move if you don't like living there?

Yes, I would. Location, location, location. And in your case, schools as well. Every house move we've made has been with schools as the first criteria.

Thank you....location then...I have always been frugal and gone for lots of house for my money in the best part of the cheaper to live areas and I have lived in some amazing spaces that way......
So.....we could not stay in the school if we left the house so good chance we would be there many years.....I guess must simplify as there is less space..as we wil lose a bedroom and go down to 2 bedroom...but it does have a massive garage so we can store a lot of our excess stuff.
It is so less an inspiring house than what we are in now...we literally come back from holidays and delight in getting home as it is so peaceful and beautiful where we are now so it feels odd to choose a house that is smaller, has a rubbish view, is near a busy road....but is walking distance to an outstanding school.....so funny how once you have kids their needs totally trump your own....clearly we will miss our beautiful spacious house with its million dollar view...but the house is down the road for a nasa facility....so loads of scientist send their kids there...they even have a robotics after school club....that just makes me smile....so we take the unimpressive house with rubbish view for the impressive school.....we drove past the school and we were totally taken aback....on this tree lined street with just millionaires houses....not that we aspire to that but it was just so green and clean and lovely and we will never get to buy in this kind of area on our moderate income.
A friend who has lived up there all her life....said the school district send people at night to check you live at the address as there is so much shenanigans with people trying to use others addresses. So our naive idea we could move half a mile down the road , whilst staying in the good school, to a cheaper place has been dashed....we have to stay in this house to access the school and unlikely anything else will come up in such an area that we could get even get close to affording.
Ahh kind of sad and excited at the same time. I brought both my babies home to this wonderful woodland home...and I am leaving this for a school.

An amazing school will benefit them far more long term, than a woodland view. It may even increase their earning power to the point of one day being able to buy their own woodland; and you can build a little granny cabin right in the middle of it all for yourself
Speculate to accumulate, and all that jazz.

Be warned - you could move virtually onto school premises and not be guaranteed a place there.
Being really close increases your chances but doesn't give a guarantee

Hopping, OP lives in the states, so perhaps schools are not oversubscribed and she will get a spot. I would go for the better school district, hands down.

Location is everything.

Desirable area with great schools trumps a view, without a doubt.

Oh I'm sorry, I was thrown by the fact that the rent increase mentioned "quid"
Ignore me!!!

Yep school every time

LOL, I just read your title as of rather than for - amazing view of a petrol station!

Is the mediocre school that bad? What are you basing your views on? Ofsted? League table results? Have you visited both schools?

I would also recommend visiting both schools before you decide. Where we are (UK), we could have gone for a school rated Outstanding or another rated Good but we didn't because the school we chose, even though it was Satisfactory, just seemed like a kinder place for a little kid to be. Our choice has paid off in spades (the rating has gone up, but more importantly our child is thriving and excelling and loves school). The school that is supposedly Outstanding seemed like a joyless place when we looked round. Several people I know have taken their kids out since we all made our choices.

I am Los Angeles and any schools run by la unified are pretty challenged. We are close to a Local school in poorest area of this part of a nice city within LA.....everyone knows there are two good areas in the whole of this massive city.....so literally a handful of top rated primaries.....but of course it is where all the million and beyond dollar homes are...which few can afford...but this unusually affordable small house has come up and it is literally the shed on the street lined with the very expensive homes...quite odd....but makes it affordable at equivalent of 1700 quid a month...similar to London prices for a good school area I imagine....we applied today.
Good points about giving up the woodland view for the future benefits....
I guess it is the greenery t
Around the school and streets that has won us over.....we never thought we could ever afford this area...and we just about can...if we go camping from now on.....till I return to work in a couple of years.
Just feel sad we have to leave a kind of dream house that has made me so incredibly happy....I look out at pine trees and just greenery and a little Kiplingesque church....yet am ten minutes from downtown LA...but yes we can see the benefits of giving up the view....I will blind up the windows so the garage is obscured.
Total certain we get in...rang school board.....then they offer up remaining places to the NASA staff kids who work in the area.....but geographic location guarantees your local school here.
Thanks guys...how do I let go of my live for my home and the view.....I just have to focus on future benefits. It is one of the top school districts in the US....so yes trading mediocre local school with other languages than english dominant on playground for exceptional school I terms of results.
Hope son will cope with academic pressures which will be part and parcel I am sure.

Sorry to confuse hopping green.....just giving the pound equivalent.....what are rents in London today for 2 bed homes in nice area...maybe even more than 1700 pounds right! Ahhh we have to pay so much for our roof these days...how times have changed.

Have a little experience of schools in LA. Wonderland? I would check carefully to make sure that it is right for you and your child. It may have an excellent reputation but you may find that all the 'good' resources end when the children are 8 and the wealthy families send their children to private school. Pastoral care isn't the same either. The pressure to conform is immense and there isn't the same acceptance of unusual behaviours even if they aren't disruptive.

Thank sn sister...really good to have that view.....not wonderland...la Canada ....I am now starting to think that I should be more worried about gas fumes and the load of traffic passing by on the busy road so close by....it is an area where many do put their kids in the high school.....which is another reason it is so desirable.
I just do not want some urban concrete institution that there are so many of here and the greenery if the area and around the schools....as well of course the good performance of the schools....but yeah those fumes cannot be good so close to your home.

i would put my dc's education first every time. best thing you can do for them.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11518287
I'd be worried about the benzene exposure. Equally, is it a 24hr station? consider light pollution, noise, potential antisocial behaviour esp if it has a shop attached (robberies etc) even if it's a lovely area.

If you plan to be there a long time then plant a load of trees to block the view of the petrol station and improve air quality?

I didnt understand the bit about addresses and having to stay in catchment to remain at the school. What would happen if your landlord gave you notice once you had been at the school for a couple of years?

Bristol
Yoh are so right,,,a biochemist friend said the same thing....apparently yoh do not want to live opposite a gas station and near a freeway...loads of bad chemicals and fumes so it looks like that is the deal breaker in the end.
Bristol...yes you have to leave the school as soon as you move even if you are one house out of the catchment...you have to prove where you live every year so people do not try and beat the system....
Ok so the house is out...shame we paid to apply but there you go.....glad we did not sign. Health more important than education.
It looks like we could find a house in the area next door...still good schools by any standard....but just a less wealthy neighbourhood so has a different vibe...still nice just not so tree lined and just breath takingly beautiful...

Ok so I went to look at a massive house tonight2000 square feet walking distance from the school we live but out of budget by 700 dollars a month...we would have to use savings to make the 3200 rent but it was breathtaking...kind of old worn house inside ....but just this incredible lush setting.....like living in a forest really....anyway I enquired about the second house on the property which is just a one bed house above a double garage....kind of divided from main house with some bushes so pretty private....anyway I wondered if they would rent it and they said they would consider it a year from now when their return from sabbatical..one is a doctor heading to London for a year funnily enough....
Anyway they seemed interested...so we may get to stay in the house we love for another year and then when we need the school...a year from now....we move to this one bed and store most of our belongings in the double garage....save some money and access this beautiful area ....

So now the question is could you go from a 1100 square got 3 bed to an 800 sq foot one bed with two under 5 s for an amazing school and an incredibly beautiful neighbourhood? I kind of like the Idea of living simply for a year but somewhere incredibly beautiful that we will never ever afford....or we get the affordable 1100 sq foot in the more ordinary neighbourhood a mile down the road for 2200 dollars a month...guest house on beautiful property would be around1500 a month....
No decision to be made now...but I am thinking we have to so promise on the house we get to access the very best school, we can access. That means we must leave our current house we love so much , no later than a year from now.
Would you squeeze into a one bed to live in a little heaven like area with an idyllic school.? Or take more space in a more ordinary school still with very solid schools....scores are very similar bit that I just go by that?
Thanks for all the input.
Why did we not think of the fumes.....I think I wanted it so badly I ignored the garage almost in the front room))

Sorry I meant tricot...I actually called the school board to ask your exact question....so you must live in the area and the map drawn up is very clear. You can get a teaching job and get your kids in this way but only one high school so might be hard for me to get in that way...although I am a teacher.

Excuse weird iPad typos....life too short to go back and change!

I dont think that there is any sense in moving to a one bed in an unaffordable area. Could you really see all of you still sharing at the end of their school years? No! So you would have to move..... And if you cant afford to stay inside catchment you will have the disruption of moving house and school. Not good. Go for the affordable area with almost as good schools. You are the teacher so you know how much of it all comes from home anyway!

Oh I know but to live in paradise...honestly it is just breath takingly beautiful....no the plan would...be within two years to find a job in the district...as soon as I work there we can stay in the school....that we have started in by taking the 1 bed only 200 square foot less than the 2 bed we will probably get down the road...I mean people live in less on japan and HK.....anyway it is not for a while.

Can you link to houses?

To be fair it sounds like you have no intention of giving up on the forest setting one and are jumping on the health bandwagon. Plenty people live near or across from petrol stations with no ill effects.

Education every time for me regardless of what I wanted.

Anyway link to them so we can understand more fully

Oh we will leave this house ...but we have another 13 months before we have to.

Ok so we were sold on the house till I mentioned to a harvard educated friend with a biochemistry degree, we were going to take this house but the big compromise was that it is opposite the petrol station and close to a freeway...she said we were crazy to think about it with a kid with asthma.....my heart sank as we had mentally moved in....it is in an amazing very wealthy area but the position of the house is not great...thinking we will just get a bigger house in area next door with still very good schools...just not these much coverted schools that are so hard to get into. I am sure for primary it matters little if a school is a 9 or a 10... Both being excellent. Of course we want the ten if we can get it, but not prepared to expose my ds to high amount of fumes...will post link...look at it set in a triangle of fumes basically. Shame as they rang back offered it at our asking of 2400 rather than 2600 but we were the only family that had applied for it which is very odd. A house down the road near the 9 rated school already has 15 families wanting to view it...so it has got to be the gas station and the proximity of freeway. We would have given up our canyon view for educational prospects but not if it risks health.

Who lives opposite a gas station...I do not know anyone....I thought everyone said houses near gas stations and railway lines are always rentals as they are difficult to sell.