How horrible is the commute from Ashburn to DC

[Anonymous]

I know people who live in Long Island who commute into Manhattan by air.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would be going into the office 3 days a week

3 kids

Looking to cash in on appreciation of our McLean home that we bought 6 years ago

Wife works from home

why do you need the cash?

OP here

I'm in one of those careers where you can make a lot of money and die at age 50 having never seen your kids or hop out at age 40, move to government, and make 5-10% of your prior salary as a GS-15. I'm opting for the latter

So...biglaw partner to DOJ trial attorney?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would be going into the office 3 days a week

3 kids

Looking to cash in on appreciation of our McLean home that we bought 6 years ago

Wife works from home

why do you need the cash?

OP here

I'm in one of those careers where you can make a lot of money and die at age 50 having never seen your kids or hop out at age 40, move to government, and make 5-10% of your prior salary as a GS-15. I'm opting for the latter

So...biglaw partner to DOJ trial attorney?

NP DOJ trial attorneys do not have sedate work lives. If you are looking for work/life balance, that ain’t it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would be going into the office 3 days a week

3 kids

Looking to cash in on appreciation of our McLean home that we bought 6 years ago

Wife works from home

why do you need the cash?

OP here

I'm in one of those careers where you can make a lot of money and die at age 50 having never seen your kids or hop out at age 40, move to government, and make 5-10% of your prior salary as a GS-15. I'm opting for the latter

So...biglaw partner to DOJ trial attorney?

NP DOJ trial attorneys do not have sedate work lives. If you are looking for work/life balance, that ain’t it.

And they're not looking to hire 50 year old partners looking for retirement gigs.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't recommend it. It will take you a solid hour and a half on the train each way (at least), if you want to metro, and if you drive, it will cost a small fortune (tolls and presumably parking garage). If you can get away with going into the office twice a week, that might be passable, but I think you'll feel pretty miserable doing it any more than that. I say this as someone who also has a long commute (I go to DC 3 times a week from Reston).

Do you need to be in Ashburn or could you consider somewhere a little bit closer? My commute is about an hour, give or take, and while I don't love it, it's generally manageable.

[Anonymous]

Horrible commute.
Some companies have carpool vans for people living in Ashburn and Aldie and going east for work.

[Anonymous]

So how long would it take??

[Anonymous]

I don’t think it is too bad. I worked in Bethesda and had a few Ashburn people.

[Anonymous]

Wel it's either easily $50 in tolls each way or 1.5-2 hours on the metro. No thank you.

Bethesda commute is totally different than downtown DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You should look into traveling by helicopter for those 3 days.

or

Travel by car. Try to cut down the trips into DC to just 2 days back to back. Stay at a hotel. Then drive back home.

Yeah, this is realistic. Just stay at at hotel 2 nights a week.

Ashburn is not really a suburb of dmv - it’s like an area within 50 miles of a real city.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't recommend it. It will take you a solid hour and a half on the train each way (at least), if you want to metro, and if you drive, it will cost a small fortune (tolls and presumably parking garage). If you can get away with going into the office twice a week, that might be passable, but I think you'll feel pretty miserable doing it any more than that. I say this as someone who also has a long commute (I go to DC 3 times a week from Reston).

Do you need to be in Ashburn or could you consider somewhere a little bit closer? My commute is about an hour, give or take, and while I don't love it, it's generally manageable.

Yes, does it have to be Ashburn? Why Ashburn?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Would be going into the office 3 days a week

3 kids

Looking to cash in on appreciation of our McLean home that we bought 6 years ago

Wife works from home

McLean real estate really holds its value. And you have a good chance to get near private school education for free at your public schools. If you need cash you can get a home equity loan. Moving the family to Ashburn causes more issues than it resolves.

[Anonymous]

That is a hellish commute. My DH lived in Ashburn and I was in DC while we dated. I tried driving out to Ashburn during a weekday after work and it was horrible and I refused to do it. DH then had a job where he was able to get out early so he came to DC during the week and did the reverse commute. He left around 3pm and it was still pretty bad but not as bad as leaving the city.

I only drove out there on the weekends and even that drive was bad. No traffic but just way too far from DC, good 45-50 minutes with no traffic. It’s going to easily be 1.5 hours if not more of commute during rush hour to/from DC.

BTW OP, you have no idea how bad the infrastructure is in Ashburn. Tons of new development within the past 10 years with absolutely no expansion of the roads and the traffic is horrible getting in and out to the toll road during rush hour. I won’t even go into how expensive the toll road is and traffic there is bad. It’s also so damn boring out there, the restaurant choices are terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would be going into the office 3 days a week

3 kids

Looking to cash in on appreciation of our McLean home that we bought 6 years ago

Wife works from home

why do you need the cash?

OP here

I'm in one of those careers where you can make a lot of money and die at age 50 having never seen your kids or hop out at age 40, move to government, and make 5-10% of your prior salary as a GS-15. I'm opting for the latter

Are you insane?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would be going into the office 3 days a week

3 kids

Looking to cash in on appreciation of our McLean home that we bought 6 years ago

Wife works from home

why do you need the cash?

OP here

I'm in one of those careers where you can make a lot of money and die at age 50 having never seen your kids or hop out at age 40, move to government, and make 5-10% of your prior salary as a GS-15. I'm opting for the latter

So...biglaw partner to DOJ trial attorney?

NP DOJ trial attorneys do not have sedate work lives. If you are looking for work/life balance, that ain’t it.

I billed 2800 hours last year. Is the DOJ really comparable?