Reply to Would we regret moving to the DMV?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP,  it sounds like you’ve done a good amount of research on housing costs, but less so on career paths for lawyers in your specific situation — i.e., lawyers wanting to move, whether in the shorter or longer term, from a big-firm investigations practice to either a government job or something else.   You might want to post on the jobs forum to ask how someone like you or your spouse would find an exit path from a big firm.  That could help you assess whether DC would actually offer better professional options than staying in Philadelphia.  [/quote]

You should also consider that many firm and agency jobs in DC involve a lot of travel. If you are trying to move here to avoid regular travel to NYC, be certain that you're not trading for another job with frequent travel.

On the positive side, the DC area is very friendly and you would find it easy to put down roots, especially since you are a young family. Many people are transplants. As others have said, the schools aren't as good as they used to be, but that might be true everywhere. [/quote]

Good to know re: travel expectations at agency jobs. I hadn't realized that. I've seen people mention that school performance is trending downward both here and in other threads in this forum. What are the main issues - overcrowding, teacher turnover, other COVID-related issues? Are there specific schools in the closer-in MD/VA suburbs or in NW DC that should be avoided? (I'm sure I can find long discussions of these issues elsewhere on the site, but any info is helpful in thinking about our options.) I'm not sure how the schools in the DC area compare to the schools on the Main Line or in South Jersey, but we think we'd be happy with the latter if we stay in the area. Private schools in DC seem out of reach unless one of us stays in big law long term - and even then, we don't want to have to stretch to come up with tuition. Admissions also seem super competitive.[/quote]

OP, I think that it's worth giving a little more detail into what you are looking for in terms of schools. For better or worse, DC does attracts a certain type of person for whom anything but "the best" is not good enough, and that person is unusually prevalent on this website. Ergo, the schools are always said to be on the down slide, there are no affordable living options even for two-lawyer couples, etc. The reality is that DC has a higher concentration of households like yours (two well-educated high earners) than just about any place in the country, and there are plenty of ways to make it work depending on what you prioritize.

If I were in your shoes, I would make the move to DC, but actually settle in the city in a neighborhood more like the one you're used to for a few years. You can definitely do public elementary school in a nice neighborhood with a pretty decent rowhouse in your price range. I'd look at places like Capitol Hill, Glover Park, or Mt. Pleasant that are reasonably quiet and family friendly; there will be lots of households similar to yours in all of these places. Depending on how you feel about the schools and the neighborhood at that point, you can still make your way to the suburbs, or you can consider charter or private schools, or you may even decide that you are satisfied with the public school options. There is quite a bit of variation in the quality of the DC public high schools, and there are also things like magnet schools to consider, so if you're serious about that possibly, I would spend some time learning about the in-bound options and the lottery system before you buy into a neighborhood.

I think the idea of move to the DC area but also jump to the suburbs at the same time is honestly just making your decision much harder than it needs to be. From how you are describing your situation, I think you will like it here a lot.[/quote]

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