First time AA homebuyer looking to leave DC

[Anonymous]

I'm 28, DH is 29. Both of us are black. We have 2 kids <10 and have remote IT jobs. Looking to move to a safer area to raise them with good schools. Open to anywhere (not MOCO) in the DC area, need to be within 200 miles of job however. Unsure of this but I trust you all so can you give us some places?

[Anonymous]

budget?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm 28, DH is 29. Both of us are black. We have 2 kids <10 and have remote IT jobs. Looking to move to a safer area to raise them with good schools. Open to anywhere (not MOCO) in the DC area, need to be within 200 miles of job however. Unsure of this but I trust you all so can you give us some places?

A 200 mile radius from DC covers a lot of ground and lots of safe areas with good schools. It might help if you listed other things that are important to you. What do you like to do when you're not working? Do you prefer urban areas, suburbs, small towns, rural, etc.?

[Anonymous]

Pre-pandemic, a lot of IT people I worked with liked Howard County. Lots of black and mixed-race families said they loved it (lots of non-black families loved it too). Nice neighbors, good schools, etc. Just passing that along for you to consider in case being around other UMC black people is something you're looking for.

[Anonymous]

How about old town Alexandria?

[Anonymous]

Need to know your budget but we're an AA family in West Springfield and we love it.

[Anonymous]

Why not MoCo?

[Anonymous]

Richmond suburbs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm 28, DH is 29. Both of us are black. We have 2 kids <10 and have remote IT jobs. Looking to move to a safer area to raise them with good schools. Open to anywhere (not MOCO) in the DC area, need to be within 200 miles of job however. Unsure of this but I trust you all so can you give us some places?

Columbia, Md. Came out as safest city in America. Better schools than moco

[Anonymous]

Stay away from VA and stick to MD.

Youngkin will destroy VA schools and your kids deserve better.

Columbia MD. Excellent schools best gift you can give your kids is a great education.

[Anonymous]

Columbia or Ellicott city Maryland, silver spring, west Springfield or burke. Maybe Charles county and consider private schools. Similarly, Bowie or University Park.

[Anonymous]

Shepherd park is DC but could be a good fit. Also maybe Laurel?

[Anonymous]

Columbia is nice, but take that "safest city" thing with a grain of salt. Here are the rankings:

https://wallethub.com/edu/safest-cities-in-america/41926

Notice only 182 cities in the US are included. I am sure places like Chevy Chase or Bethesda are pretty safe but they didn't have large enough populations to be included.

[Anonymous]

We’re black, mid 30s, one toddler. We absolutely love Bowie, MD. Schools aren’t a huge issue for us because we plan to do the lottery or private. Our 600k house (5k sqft) gave us a lot of budget flexibility in where we send our daughter.

We lived in Arlington VA before this and enjoyed it but knew there wasn’t enough diversity to comfortably raise our future children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We’re black, mid 30s, one toddler. We absolutely love Bowie, MD. Schools aren’t a huge issue for us because we plan to do the lottery or private. Our 600k house (5k sqft) gave us a lot of budget flexibility in where we send our daughter.

We lived in Arlington VA before this and enjoyed it but knew there wasn’t enough diversity to comfortably raise our future children.

DP; I was going to suggest Bowie, which is a wonderful community, but also look at Columbia!