Bigger home on busy street v. Smaller home on quiet street

[Anonymous]

What would you do? This is for CC, DC. Busy streets being Western, Reno, Nebraska, Military and Nevada. Obviously, we prefer the quieter side street. However the house on busier street has larger lot, significantly more room and is in far better condition. Is it a mistake info for it? This house is more expensive than the house on the quiet street. However, not by that much. We think it may be a lot of value. It is the first thing for under 1.1M that we have actually liked.

[Anonymous]

Sounds like you have made up your mind. I'm guessing it also helps your commute to be on a main artery.

[Anonymous]

Is it the kind of street where you will have difficulty pulling in and out of the driveway?

[Anonymous]

Will you make much use of your yard and if so will you have enough backyard to compensate for not being able to use the front as much?

[Anonymous]

We are in a street in CCDC that gets busy at certain times but the house more than makes up for it. Large backyard and enough front yard we made a circular drive. Before that we used to back in to the drive just to geta quicker safer start when we left. Not sure of the others but parts of western and nevada aren't bad. I wouldn't want as busy as military or Nebraska though.

[Anonymous]

In general, I'd pick quiter street. You can increase a house size but not decrease traffic/street size.

[Anonymous]

A busy street wouldn't bother me so much as to not buy if it had a lot of other positive features. I don't think Western an Reno are any better than Nebraska or Military.

In terms of evaluating the busy streets it all depends on which particular stretch the house is on. Nebraska, North of Military is fine. However, Nebraska around Connecticut could be troublesome.

[Anonymous]

I would not buy on Military. It is a major commuter route. It gets a tremendous amount of traffic.

[Anonymous]

What age kids? The busy street would bother me more with little ones who like to play outside. After about 10, I think kids are generally either inside or away from home.

Do you need more space? For example, if I had 4 kids, I'd probably pick 5 bedrooms on a busy street over 3 on a quiet street, but if I had 1 and didn't plan to have more, I'd pick the latter.

[Anonymous]

Nevada wouldnt bother me. Western and Military would. Depends where on the street for the other two.

[Anonymous]

I'd pick quieter street. You'll grow to regret the traffic, and that will ruin the rest of the house for you. Every zooming car will be a reminder.

[Anonymous]

In my experience, being on a busy street meant being less connected to my neighbors, which is important to me. People are less likely to be outside in front of their houses. This wasn't in upper NW though so I can't speak for what you would experience in that neighborhood.

[Anonymous]

I'd pick a smaller house/lot on a quieter street. I can't stand a lot of vehicular traffic past my house. I'm living in a house now whose street is being used as a cut-through during rush hour and I'm desperate to move.

[Anonymous]

We bought on a busy street in Arlington and it's not that big a deal. But it helps that we're fenced and on a corner lot, and our driveway faces the side street.

The plus side is we get power back first during outages, we get plowed first during storms, and we managed to lowball the house in the first place (which was related to circumstances other than its location on a busy street).

What I hear is that being on a busy street can hurt your resale at the margins because there's a somewhat smaller pool of buyers who will even consider it, but this is a metropolitan area -- lots and lots of houses on busy streets and lots and lots of people buying them everyday.

That said, there are varying degrees of "busy." I couldn't tolerate Georgia Avenue north of the Beltway in that stretch up to Wheaton, for example. But my state road in Arlington is really only busy twice a day -- evening and morning rush.

[Anonymous]

I'd never buy on a busy street. I've passed up lots of great houses because they are on busy streets. That's a nonnegotiable issue for me. Some people I know live in great houses on busy streets and are perfectly happy. I like to garden and sit outside and chat with my neighbors, and that's so unpleasant on a busy street with cars and exhaust fumes. Plus my child has asthma, so the air quality is much worse right on a busy street. I'd choose the smaller, cheaper house. Move up when you have more money or add on to the smaller house. You can never change the traffic noise, though; you are stuck with that forever.