Anonymous wrote:Ok, but if you bought a house between 2014 and today, you knew the deal with DCPS and lottery odds. All the data was available if you cared to look. To cite just one example,
Latin MS was impossible back then, too

So the rest of DCUM finds it “annoying” to listen to the complaints and occasional whines from this cohort now that Oscar and Genevieve are 8 and Eliot Hine is still Eliot Hine. You made your bed.

This. Why would parents of tiny tots buy homes on CH, where housing is expensive, hoping to stay put, if they weren't clued in to the problem of access to high-performing public middle and high schools in the DC system? The writing has been on the wall all along that the Ward 6 by-right school situation is more than a little iffy after 5th grade. No secret that the 6th-12th grade DCPS programs CH is zoned for aren't high performing, aren't improving quickly, and haven't enjoyed strong UMC buy-in since the advent of DC Home Rule. Also not a surprise that Deal or Wilson have become very difficult to crack OOB, and that Bowser has been gunning for fewer Ward 6 students at Walls for a long time.

I'm sitting on at least 500K in home equity for one reason: I gambled on a really banged-up place in a crime-ridden neighborhood with degenerate immediate neighbors before putting ridiculous sweat equity into the place over more than a decade. You guys weren't willing to do that - you bought in an area that was already thoroughly hip, relatively safe and gentrified. Now you're grumbling that, shock, Eliot-Hine, Jefferson Academy and Stuart Hobson don't meet your standards. You're also complaining that you may not crack Latin 1 or BASIS, since Latin Cooper, Two Rivers etc. clearly don't meet your standards.

You did make your bed, you just didn't know it, didn't want to believe it, couldn't or wouldn't read the tea leaves.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OK, but where is life rosier than on the Hill if you love your house and community and have an easy commute to work for a good job where you have seniority? We aren’t drawn to suburban living and could afford Gonzaga or St. Anselm’s for our boy if he were to be admitted. The grass probably isn’t greener elsewhere for many of us, even if you think it is.

great so your answer is: be rich enough for private MS and HS (and also make sure your kid gets admitted and that the commute to school works).

I mean, Gonzaga is roughly daycare prices. We all did that for at least a few years. If every MC family can afford daycare, why couldn’t they likely afford Catholic high school 10+ years later?

OMG you are living in a bubble. MC families are not paying over 20k for daycare. You are UMC or upper class.

some good posts. to the original op i think the pros of living on the hill with younger kids and attending a hill elementary school (and there are lots) outweigh the later dilemmas/cons. im less convinced by the real estate timing argument. some of the earlier hill families went to their local elementary school when it wasnt quite so gentrified and found it was surprise not so bad which changed their viewpoint re the possibility of staying long-term even if they werent quite ready to also try the in-bound middle school.

Ok, but if you bought a house between 2014 and today, you knew the deal with DCPS and lottery odds. All the data was available if you cared to look. To cite just one example,
Latin MS was impossible back then, too

So the rest of DCUM finds it “annoying” to listen to the complaints and occasional whines from this cohort now that Oscar and Genevieve are 8 and Eliot Hine is still Eliot Hine. You made your bed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OK, but where is life rosier than on the Hill if you love your house and community and have an easy commute to work for a good job where you have seniority? We aren’t drawn to suburban living and could afford Gonzaga or St. Anselm’s for our boy if he were to be admitted. The grass probably isn’t greener elsewhere for many of us, even if you think it is.

great so your answer is: be rich enough for private MS and HS (and also make sure your kid gets admitted and that the commute to school works).

I mean, Gonzaga is roughly daycare prices. We all did that for at least a few years. If every MC family can afford daycare, why couldn’t they likely afford Catholic high school 10+ years later?

I live on the Hill and I'll say one thing about this conversation:

Your attitude on the viability of MS/HS options on the Hill is often driven by whether you bought your home within the last 8-10 years, versus 10 or more years ago. People who bought earlier tend to have more willingness to figure it out because they are sitting on a gold mine -- relatively low mortgage plus skyrocketing house value gives you tons and tons of options. If you've got a basement you can lease out? Even better. The reason you encounter "middle class" people on the Hill who are blasé about these issues is that they are very fortunate (yes, fortunate, you didn't buy on the Hill when you did because you are some kind of real estate savant, you bought here because that's when you could afford to buy and housing on the Hill was affordable back then) in their housing timing and therefore have or can access cash more easily. This enables them to do things like "try out" SH for a year and see how it goes, hope for the best in the lottery and see how it goes, assume they can "always" rent or buy in NW or the suburbs if they need to.

If you bought long enough ago that your own a house on the Hill but pay less than say 2800 in monthly mortgage payments, you always have access to cash. You can lease your house for a few years and make money off of it. You could sell it for a huge cash windfall. Or you can just live in it and pocket the money that your neighbors are paying just to live there.

If you bought in the last 8 years or so years, you either have a huge mortgage payment (like 3k and up, maybe way up depending on location and size of your house) or you live in a teeny tiny home that you are struggling to imagine staying in as your kids hit MS age (a condo or condo-alternative house, no outdoor space, maybe just 700-800 sq ft).

People in the latter situation, even if they can afford their mortgage and have job security, are much more likely to go looking for more certainty in their school situation past elementary. They are in a fundamentally different financial situation and cannot simply magic up cash for private, nor do they have the flexibility with renting out their home, that people who bought earlier did. They also may worry more about things like saving for college or retirement because they are not going to see the same equity out of their homes and cannot save as aggressively as someone with a much lower mortgage payment.

It is annoying to me how few people seem to understand this and want to attribute these differences to personality or something. It's not. Most of this is just about timing, real estate, and $$$. And regardless of how modest you might think your income is ("DH is just a GS-11 and I'm a teacher! We're not rich."), if you are sitting on 500k or more in home equity in your CH row house, you are, for all intents and purposes, wealthy. Your education choices will reflect that.

A little optimism and determination can go a long way where schooling EotP goes. If you need certainty and lack the dough for privates, the burbs are waiting for you. We know Hill families that got off waiting lists for BASIS and Latin in Sept. We know others that got better than expected fi aid at privates they thought they couldn’t afford.

Anonymous wrote:OK, but where is life rosier than on the Hill if you love your house and community and have an easy commute to work for a good job where you have seniority? We aren’t drawn to suburban living and could afford Gonzaga or St. Anselm’s for our boy if he were to be admitted. The grass probably isn’t greener elsewhere for many of us, even if you think it is.

great so your answer is: be rich enough for private MS and HS (and also make sure your kid gets admitted and that the commute to school works).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:+1. We've had the same thought, we could rent in the burbs just for high school if necessary.

We can manage with our IB middle school (Stuart Hobson) if we lack a better option. We're not about to sell up and leave over middle school after more than 20 years on CH. We plan to be empty nesters in our historic neighborhood. You guys move if that works for you. We won't.

This. We could rent in Tenleytown or something. The kids might enjoy Wisconsin Ave and being close to school and all the shops and stuff. But no way would I actually sell our place on the Hill until the market was right and I was ready to figure out the tax stuff.

the point I’m trying to make, as someone facing down this likelihood next year, is that it is very disruptive to us and our kid. Nobody “just moves to the burbs” like that. it’s a big change, expense, and leaving your life behind. and a big deal for kids.

Anonymous wrote:+1. We've had the same thought, we could rent in the burbs just for high school if necessary.

We can manage with our IB middle school (Stuart Hobson) if we lack a better option. We're not about to sell up and leave over middle school after more than 20 years on CH. We plan to be empty nesters in our historic neighborhood. You guys move if that works for you. We won't.

This. We could rent in Tenleytown or something. The kids might enjoy Wisconsin Ave and being close to school and all the shops and stuff. But no way would I actually sell our place on the Hill until the market was right and I was ready to figure out the tax stuff.

+1. We've had the same thought, we could rent in the burbs just for high school if necessary.

We can manage with our IB middle school (Stuart Hobson) if we lack a better option. We're not about to sell up and leave over middle school after more than 20 years on CH. We plan to be empty nesters in our historic neighborhood. You guys move if that works for you. We won't.

Anonymous wrote:OK, but where is life rosier than on the Hill if you love your house and community and have an easy commute to work for a good job where you have seniority? We aren’t drawn to suburban living and could afford Gonzaga or St. Anselm’s for our boy if he were to be admitted. The grass probably isn’t greener elsewhere for many of us, even if you think it is.

+1. I love our Hill house and community and I want to stay. My kids go to our IB DCPS. I hope they lottery for BASIS or Latin. If not, we’ll try out SH (our IB) or maybe Latin 2 if it’s an option/depending on how things shake out there. We are also prepared to pay for private high school, if needed. It actually doesn’t stress me out that much. What’s the absolute worst case scenario? We rent our our home and rent somewhere in NW or the burbs for awhile.

+100!

OK, but where is life rosier than on the Hill if you love your house and community and have an easy commute to work for a good job where you have seniority? We aren’t drawn to suburban living and could afford Gonzaga or St. Anselm’s for our boy if he were to be admitted. The grass probably isn’t greener elsewhere for many of us, even if you think it is.

Anonymous wrote:If you have boys and some money for private, Gonzaga might be an option for high school

Gonzaga is over 25k a year and competitive, especially if you are not coming from a Catholic feeder. Reality is limited spots at good privates in the city and what spots there are, it’s competitive.