London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Hello everyone. I am brand new here and would love some advice.

My husband is being relocated from London to NYC and we are hoping to move out there next January.

I have a 5year old and a 2 year old and just want some opinions on the best places to live with a family.

We have looked in depth at Montclair as it seems to offer a good balance of family living whilst not been too much of a hike into the city, primary schools seem to be of a good standard and the properties seem to offer good value for money (I know the taxes are high though). It also seems to be a similar sort of place to West London which is where we currently live (and love living).

We are looking to buy rather than rent.

What other suburbs should I be considering? My husband doesn't really want to be commuting for more than an hour if at all possible but he will be woking 2 days from home so could be longer by a bit! At this stage I think we would prefer to be in New Jersey than Westchester area so that it is easier to get to the airport and go back to the UK and for family and friends to come and visit but not sure if that will be an issue when we are there?!?!!

Any help/advice/support would be so much appreciated.

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Welcome,
I lived in Upper Montclair for 10 years. There is a big difference between Upper Montclair and Montclair.
At the time I didn't have my son in the schools there, but the schools are good, however, they are not the best in NJ - usually around the Summit/Millburn/Chatham area have the best NJ schools.
Try looking at SchoolDigger.com - the Easy Way to Evaluate K-12 School Performance and GreatSchools - Public and Private School Ratings, Reviews and Parent Community
The town is very accessible to NYC and has a very diverse feel to it, in my honest opinion, Summit area has a more snobbish feel to it.
There are lots of restaurants and things to do in comparison to other NJ towns. I would back if we could afford it :)
Easy accessible to Newark and JFK airport.
Let me know if you have any other questions....there is also a British pie shop there with lots of goodies minus maybe the Cadbury goodies that were recently banned.:(

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Welcome to the forum.

The commute time will increase dramatically if your husband has to take the subway in addition to the Metro North railroad (overland trains). So if he's working downtown, add another 30 minutes (on a good day) for the subway ride from Grand Central.

I can't answer your other questions, as I live in the city and do not have kids. Best of luck.

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Welcome to BE.

Several years ago we had a member called Elfman...he lived in Monclair but decided to move when children arrived. Search for his posts and they may give you a little insight. I'm using my phone at the moment and it's just about impossible to post links...but if you use the BE search engine you should be able to find them.

Likewise...search for posts by Englishmum. She lived in Millburn...about 45 to 30 mins to Manhattan by rail. She also posted excellent info re schools, housing etc. I lived near Morristown...approx 60 mins by rail to Manhattan.

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

We lived in Westchester for 8 months, renting, while looking for a house to buy with reasonable compromise of cost, commute time, and quality of life. At that time schools were not even a consideration. We looked at everywhere from lower Westchester northwards to Duchess and Putnam counties, as well as looking at New Jersey, and Long Island. After finding virtually no overlap between affordability and desirability within commuting distance of my employer's office we gave up and left New York. ..... To the OP, just make sure that your husband is paid enough to support an acceptable quality of life, because the cost of living there is insane.

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Hi Veejay

We moved from West London (Maida Vale) back in 08 to New Jersey (and then back to London for 2 years in that time). We live in Long Hill Township (about 30 miles from Montclair). Its all nothing like West London :) but at least I now have a big house and garden!

I did the commute to the city for about a year and still do it once a week at the moment. I now work in Parsippany / Berkeley Heights for the other 4 days. I know the summit / new providence / chatham area well.

It takes me around an 80 minutes to get to downtown (Train and Ferry), about an hour to get to Midtown. The travel time will be greatly dependant on where your Hubby's Office is.

So if you decide to look a little more west let me know any questions.

Goat

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Thank you everyone for your comments and helpful advice. I have now started looking much more closely at Milburn, Chatham, Madison and Short Hills (although I think the latter is well out of my budget!). My main priority is schools and I am concerned about the magnet system in Montclair as we would be arriving in the middle of the academic year and I am worried that my son would be placed in a not so good school as they had places.

Can anyone advise me on the school systems in these other places are they just based on where you live? Also if anyone can post advice about travel times to Penn station from these options and the reality of this journey (is it a 40/50 min journey standing all the way?, is it had to park at the stations, costs involved, is it feasible to walk to the stations?).
Millburn seems to be quick and Madison the furthest.

My priorities at this moment in time are:

Schools
Good area/community
Commute time
House

Thank you again!

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

We moved to NY for the first time in 2003, kids were 5 & 18mths schools were our priority too.

We decided on lower Westchester, excellent schools, easy commute, great for families and reasonable rents. We only planned to be here two years.

Moved back to the UK 2005, after 6 months decided we had a better quality of life in the US and started on the route to get back. We moved back to the same town in 2007.

Schools still excellent, some not only rated in the top 1% in the state but also rated in the top 5% in the country. Commute still easy and still great for families however rents and house prices have gone through the roof! In our town houses are selling over list price due to bidding wars between families with young kids trying to get into the school district. Also be aware property taxes are high too, good schools and high property taxes go hand in hand.

Drive to JFK from Westchester takes me less than 40 minutes, we avoid Newark at all costs after two really bad experiences waiting 3+ hours to get through immigration. Longest it's taken to get through JFK is about an hour usually it's very quick, I appreciate everyone has different airport experiences. Plus we have found better flight times and prices flying into JFK especially using miles to upgrade.

Re: London to NYC move with family - where to look!
 

Hi Veejay

I don't tend to get as excited about schools as other folks around here. However my view is that this:
-> Your kids will be well ahead of the locals on arrival. The british system starts earlier and is slightly different in approach. My kids attended private school in london and we sent them to public here. After two years they are still ahead but the school district offers an advanced type program which both are in.
-> I don't believe that the earlier years matters as much to be honest other than the existence of the advanced program at the lower grades.
-> When selecting a town our criteria was more focused on the higher grades (ie high school) than the lower grades. We looked at each area and decided that we wanted our kids to attend a larger high school. The reasons mainly where around facilities to be honest (smaller school districts had less variety). There is also a higher chance that we might opt for Private School at the high school level assuming we are still in the area at that time (being expat you never really know!) so proximity to that was also a criteria.
-> All of the areas you mention are probably over five years within the top 10% in NJ which generally has some of the best schools in the country. So I find that one town over the other comes down to personal preference and what is happening at the time.
-> So for us it came down to this - we liked the town, we liked the house, its close to private schools if we want to go down that route (Pingry etc...).

Additionally I travel alot for work internationally (Once a month at least) and being close to Newark was also a plus. I occasionally fly out of JFK and its about 2 hours drive on a normal day. Typically I'm in Japan, Manila, Brazil and London / Europe and normally I can get there direct via Newark. For me it really depends on the work policy here more than anything.

The closer you are to NY the harder it is to get parking for trains (not that its the only option - I tend to drive to Harrison and take the path when I have to go to NYC anyway).

If I do get the train I always get a seat both ways and I don't drive at all. I live within 10 mins walk of the station.

So for us it came down to community, taxes & predominant housing types.

If you want a walkable downtown (like you have in West London) then Madison, Milburn, Summit are all good choices. Chatham, New Providence less so although its pretty much down to what you like at that point.

We went a little more rural for the closeness to private schools, larger lot size and also we didn't really feel that the premium for the other towns was worth it when considering the type of housing stock and that I have didn't go to NYC every day.

I'm not sure if the heritage of the towns matter - some of these historically have attracted folks of a certain heritage and that does to some extent influence the variety of restaurants and such available.

Goat.