mum 2 3

Hi
As the title says really. Me and my OH are coming over Saturday to look at areas to live. He will be working in either Florham Park or Roseland. I spent quite sometime looking at properties online, but until you can put them into an area you like the look of its all a bit unknown.
We are spoilt here as it is less than 10 mins door to door and as part of the reason for the move is to see more of him we don't want his commute to cancel out the (hopefully) shorter working day. He currently does a UK day and then usually stays until the end of the US day too so 12-16 hours is the norm.
In reality this may not happen as he is a workaholic so I may be moving over for better quality family time with OH, not get it and also not have the backup of any friends or family locally.
Anyway waffled on a bit.....
The areas we have lined up to see are:
Kinnelon
Montville
Randolph
Mendham
Bernardsville
Florham Park

I would also like to visit Summit/Millburn but there are not any rentals there ATM which come up with our criteria.

I have used a route planner and it gives all these areas 30 mins or under from Florham Park, but just wanted see if that is realistic??
My OH comes over regularly but stays in a hotel near to work, so apart from his trips from the airport he is not familiar with the daily commuting traffic.

The schools also look good in these areas which is also what we need as we have a 7yo and twins who are 4 (5 soon) who are starting school here in 2 weeks.

This is only supposed to be an area trip as I should have a house hunting trip towards the end of September with the idea being we move by November. All being well on the visa front...

Any ideas on how long these commutes are or any areas I have missed that we should see or any other problems I haven't even thought of would be appreciated.

Thanks

Poppy girl

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=729000

Jerseygirl

I don't really know much about Kinnelon...it's further away from Florham Park than most of the other places mentioned. It will probably be cheaper to live there. Obviously if you lived in FP hubby would be right on the door step.

Mendham and Bernardsville...property and property taxes are very expensive...it's a lovely area though. Easy commute to FP...15/30 mins tops.

Randolph cheaper than Mendham and Bernardsville...traffic is usually crawling down to Morristown, Rte 10 to I 297 and I 80. Depending on whereabouts you were located in Randolph your hubby would probably use one of those route to FP.

Take a look at Chatham/Madison/Summit...towns with mainly older houses...again quite expensive.

The higher the property taxes...the better the school district. The best school districts command higher property prices.

Bob

You're in for a shock if you think the working day is less here

Should check out city-data.com for extra info and tomtom.com have a decent traffic route finder that seems to be a little more realistic about commuter journey times over idea travel times.

Welcome to BE though

mum 2 3

Thanks for the replies

I am now hooked on City-Data too. Realtor has said to pack a raincoat for the weekend. Have added Chatham and Summit to our tour.

Jerseygirl

Irene is due to hit us on Sunday.

mum 2 3

Ok Irene has thrown a spanner in the works. They are suggesting we postpone our trip. We are due in to Newark 7.10pm Saturday, staying in Livingston. Should have had 3 x 5 hour days looking at areas starting Sunday and returning to UK Tuesday night. Sunday is def going to be a no no, but do you think it is feasible to delay/just add on 2 extra days and do Tues/Wed/Thurs or do you think things will be so far from normal we wont be able to get an idea anyway??

I have 3 young children, who have only ever spent 1 night away from us and things were all working out this end with childcare, but get very difficult with any more than a couple of days adjustment. School term begins and as I have 2 new starters it wont be possible to come for at least another month, possibly till the end of October. Which could push back our house move till December or into the new year.

In the grand scheme of things its not a big deal but when you have plans its difficult to know what to do for the best??

Think I know we should probably postpone for a while but really dont want to do it .....

penguinsix

I would absolutely postpone this trip.

This is a major hurricane coming up the coast, and if projections bear out we could see most of JFK airport under water by Sunday lasting for at least 24 hours, with delays to flights rippling for days. Power will be out for 100s of thousands of customers and could remain out for days. Trees will be down on the roads. Stores will be closed, and people will be busy trying to secure basic things like food, water, shelter. The National Guard (territorials) are already on standby for a deployment, and they are preparing to evacuate as many as 250,000 people from NY city on Saturday.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/Jef...?entrynum=1899

Jerseygirl

You will not have a choice...airlines began cancelling flights yesterday. All the NY Metro Area airports will be closed. It doesn't take much rain to close even the major airports like JFK and Newark...so a hurricane will defo close them.

mum 2 3

We have postponed, hopefully only till Tuesday but will take a decision then based on how things went and airport closures etc. Hope its not as bad as they are forecasting for you out there. x

bobbedford

Here's a random but related question.

When you come over on a trip to look where you might want to live on the VWP before you have your proper Visa what do you tell immigration?

I.e. I am a little worried with saying I am working on getting a visa, and am just coming to have a look where I might want to live...

Ridski

This is one of those things that could just be a lot of downed trees and water damage, or we could all be out of power for a week. No idea how it will pan out at this time. I've planned to sit around and relax for a few days too many times before only to find out that the next day after a big storm trains were up and running and my boss was expecting me bright and early at my desk to get my hopes up again this time...



Hope it turns out okay for you next week, but be prepared to have to make detours, etc., while the clean up operation continues. This doesn't happen here too often.

Jerseygirl

If Irene stays on the projected path IMO you'll be lucky to get out for next weekend. The Governor is talking about mass power outages lasting for more than a few days. I'm all for throwing suitcases in the car and heading up to Canada until things are back to normal...but hubby wants to stay put. .

Roads to the coast are being closed so that traffic leaving can use all lanes. Hopefully Irene will head out to sea but those in the know say that's not going to happen.

I'm sorry mother nature is disrupting your plans...but spare a thought for those of us living in Irene's path.

Bob

Aren't the metro/trains being halted over the weekend too?

It'll be a rough and boring week if things kick off as badly as they are saying.

Jerseygirl

Yeah that's right. Bloomberg is telling people to use mass transit rather than clogging up the roads...then he said they would be closing down starting tomorrow afternoon.

Hopefully they are making a mountain out of a molehill ...but I've never experienced anything like this before.