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[quote=Anonymous]We were in exactly the same boat. We moved a bit earlier because we got tired of the routine sketchy stuff in the alley and street - drug deals, kids being noisy really late at night, occasional violent crime. We weren't scared off by this (I'd lived in DC for 25 years in EOTP NW) - but we knew we weren't going to stay because of schools & indoor/outdoor space. So we decided to just move and not have to explain the crack for sex deal in the alley which they would eventually see.

We chose Arlington, for some reasons like OP - family closer than in MD, but also the housing seemed like a better value than MoCo for similar commutes to DC. That is, Chevy Chase & close-in Bethesda were well over $1M for anything we could live in, which was out of our price range. We stayed under $1M in N. Arlington without too much trouble.

We've been very happy with the choice. Though we occasionally miss some things like better dining options & walkability in DC, honestly, once you have kids you don't spend all that much time at restaurants and bars. They'd rather be hanging out with the other neighborhood kids -- and you'd rather they were doing that too.

We can now walk to several amazing parks, we live in a community that has very low crime, nice neighbors and plenty of open space, we have a much bigger house, and we can walk to our kids' excellent elementary school. Driving commute to downtown DC is under 30 minutes. Commute home from downtown on a really bad day might be 45, but it's usually less. This isn't all that much longer than our door-to-door metro commutes when we lived in DC. One of us now works in VA and has a much shorter commute too.

Sure, Arlington has plenty of its own local problems (as anywhere does) but the quality of life is much higher for us overall.  We've been happy with the schools, we love having a neighborhood school & no lottery so children go to school with other neighborhood kids, love the community.
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