And back to the bike commute question. How long does it take to get to say GW hospital? Are there safe routes? (I recall a biker being ambushed on a trail a few months back.)

Does anyone commute to the hill? What's that like?

OP-- back to your original question....

You say that you will be working downtown. Do you have a spouse, and if so, where does he/she work? Downtown is an easy commute, but other parts of the city or VA can be tough (depending on if metro is an option or not).

I ask because I have a friend who moved here from NJ, and one of the main things they hated about living there was husband's commute into Manhattan. So they move here and a friend recommended Brookland. They liked it and didn't want to pay the high prices in other parts of the city and Arlington (money isn't actually an issue, their HHI is $500k, but coming from NJ they couldn't wrap their heads around the high prices for smaller houses here).

I advised them that Brookland is great but it would be a tough commute to husband's office in Virginia. I begged them to do the drive a couple times in rush hours times, but they said "Google maps says 35 minutes so it will be fine).

Well, guess what? They bought a house, and now he is miserable about his commute again. 45 minutes on the best day, but often longer.

So if you both work downtown you will be fine. Other areas might be harder.

How about biking to work ? Is there a safe route down to the National Mall? Is so, how long would that take?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a pp. I too am glad for the perception that more neighborhoods are acceptable now when compared to 1990 and 2000. Obv the neighborhoods were always there but now they are acceptable to a broader swath of the home-buying public. Ok.

However you're just not going to convince me that you easily,freely had $1m to spend and you were thinking of buying a nice house with a yard in, say, au park but you instead decided to buy in Brookland. I don't believe your budget was $1m

Why do you insist on making assumptions for other families? My husband and I just put in a contract in Colonial Village for right about $1m. Our back end DTI is 8% . We could easily afford almost any house in DC. We originally looked in Palisades but opted to not to move WOTP for other reasons.

Colonial village in no way resembles brookland. Note that I said brookland, not "3 feet east of rock creek park."

You didn't say CV, you made the assumption that anyone with a $1M budget would choose to live in AU Park. I'm telling you that I didn't even consider AU Park. I did consider Palisades, I did consider shepherd park, I did consider 16th st heights and I DID consider Brookland. If I worked downtown instead of Bethesda, it's very likely that I would have highly considered Brookland.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a pp. I too am glad for the perception that more neighborhoods are acceptable now when compared to 1990 and 2000. Obv the neighborhoods were always there but now they are acceptable to a broader swath of the home-buying public. Ok.

However you're just not going to convince me that you easily,freely had $1m to spend and you were thinking of buying a nice house with a yard in, say, au park but you instead decided to buy in Brookland. I don't believe your budget was $1m

Why do you insist on making assumptions for other families? My husband and I just put in a contract in Colonial Village for right about $1m. Our back end DTI is 8% . We could easily afford almost any house in DC. We originally looked in Palisades but opted to not to move WOTP for other reasons.

Colonial village in no way resembles brookland. Note that I said brookland, not "3 feet east of rock creek park."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a rowhouse for 1.2 mil listed in Bloomingdale:

http://m.ziprealty.com/property/64-V-ST-NW-WASHINGTON-DC-20001/15528480/detail?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=email&utm_source=zip_notify

Prices have really gone up EOTP.

Because Shep/Deal/Wilson are comparable to the DCPS options in Brookland? Seriously, you bought just barely EoTP.

We are at a popular charter so we weren't considering Shepherd. We may get zoned out of Deal so plan ongoing private after 5th. We may look at Latin. We would have looked in Brookland if I didn't commute to Bethesda.

PRevious post was for Colonial Village poster. Quotes the wrong one!

Anonymous wrote:There's a rowhouse for 1.2 mil listed in Bloomingdale:

http://m.ziprealty.com/property/64-V-ST-NW-WASHINGTON-DC-20001/15528480/detail?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=email&utm_source=zip_notify

Prices have really gone up EOTP.

Because Shep/Deal/Wilson are comparable to the DCPS options in Brookland? Seriously, you bought just barely EoTP.

Anonymous wrote:I am a pp. I too am glad for the perception that more neighborhoods are acceptable now when compared to 1990 and 2000. Obv the neighborhoods were always there but now they are acceptable to a broader swath of the home-buying public. Ok.

However you're just not going to convince me that you easily,freely had $1m to spend and you were thinking of buying a nice house with a yard in, say, au park but you instead decided to buy in Brookland. I don't believe your budget was $1m

Well, no, you're not likely to be looking in AU Park AND Brookland, because those are dramatically different areas of the city. But there certainly are some houses going for $700 K and up now in that area. It sounds ridiculous, but I think DCI is even a factor for some families as Stokes and YY families are now looking for a "forever" home.

There's a rowhouse for 1.2 mil listed in Bloomingdale:

http://m.ziprealty.com/property/64-V-ST-NW-WASHINGTON-DC-20001/15528480/detail?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=email&utm_source=zip_notify

Prices have really gone up EOTP.

Anonymous wrote:I am a pp. I too am glad for the perception that more neighborhoods are acceptable now when compared to 1990 and 2000. Obv the neighborhoods were always there but now they are acceptable to a broader swath of the home-buying public. Ok.

However you're just not going to convince me that you easily,freely had $1m to spend and you were thinking of buying a nice house with a yard in, say, au park but you instead decided to buy in Brookland. I don't believe your budget was $1m

Why do you insist on making assumptions for other families? My husband and I just put in a contract in Colonial Village for right about $1m. Our back end DTI is 8% . We could easily afford almost any house in DC. We originally looked in Palisades but opted to not to move WOTP for other reasons.

I am a pp. I too am glad for the perception that more neighborhoods are acceptable now when compared to 1990 and 2000. Obv the neighborhoods were always there but now they are acceptable to a broader swath of the home-buying public. Ok.

However you're just not going to convince me that you easily,freely had $1m to spend and you were thinking of buying a nice house with a yard in, say, au park but you instead decided to buy in Brookland. I don't believe your budget was $1m

I think the key thing is that no one should make assumptions about a person based on where they choose to live, because so many factors go into that decision. I am one of the WOTP people, and we live there because it is a 15-minute drive to my office in VA and a 15-minute metro ride for my husband to Farragut. Commute time was one of our top priorities and the neighborhood where we live, right off of Rock Creek Parkway, made the most sense for us. It's not because we're rich or only want to live near rich people. It was purely a practical decision, and we have many friends at our school in the same situation.

I am glad to hear that other neighborhoods are becoming more popular and I truly hope the school situation improves so that more people can send their kids to school in their neighborhoods (whether public or charter).

Anonymous wrote:People go to what is good and close by, no matter what the neighborhood. What's nice is that we're starting to get some of the same amenities in NE that have always been accessible to NW.

Yes, I'm the same PP that was saying NW always seemed so far away... I guess our family is a little sign of how things are changing, that families new to DC are preferring (cost of housing aside) to be in NE because that's where the school we love is and that's where we feel connected to what's important to us.

It's a good thing that there are more neighborhoods people actually want to be in! Too bad for those who need the cost of housing to stay lower, but good for those of us who can hang with the increasing values in "transitioning" (i.e. re-gentrifying) neighborhoods.