Looking for a house in Cleveland Park or Woodley

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Between your reading comprehension problems, and your propensity to set up "straw men" so you can knock them down, I don't know where to start. In any case, I did not say that Cleveland Park was a blue collar neighborhood in the 90's. I said that at that time, it had been considered to be a blue collar neighborhood "in the not too distant past," and many of the older residents remained. Most of them bought before the metro was built (the cab driver lived in a substantial single family home on one of the streets that OP wants to live on, by the way). In those days, it was not uncommon to find houses on the market that had not been touched. I remember a very large house across the street from Rosemont that had the original butler's pantry and zinc sinks from when it was built. In the 90's, real estate values were obviously going up, but people still made fun of younger people who lived there, as it was considered to be a stodgy neighborhood for retired people.

Finally, obviously many people have priorities other than length of commute. The outer burbs are teeming with them. However, what I did say is that there are a large number of very well to do folks with demanding jobs who do place a priority on a close-in location. In the 90's, most of the well-off people I knew who didn't live in Chevy Chase lived in Potomac or Bethesda or Great Falls. As bad as traffic was then, it was nothing compared to now. Today, all of those folks have moved closer in.

Even if I lose money on my next house, I'll still be ahead of those who waited to buy because "these prices just can't be sustainable." I have owned three houses in close-in Washington neighborhoods that had all doubled in value when I sold them. You didn't answer my question about whether you are a bitter renter who missed the boat on Washington real estate, so I will presume that the answer is yes.

Sounds like you don't know very many well-off people.

Your presumptions are wrong, but that's hardly a surprise.