Relocating to the North Shore? What You Need to Know

Relocating to Chicago? How to Know if the North Shore is Right for You

January 15th, 2012 by Anne West
Categories: Buying a home, Living here

If you are relocating to the Chicago area and are considering living in the suburbs, you have a lot of choices. Typically if you want to live close to the city or near the lake, you will pay more for your new home. As you go west and south you can generally find more affordable homes, bigger lots and more space for the money. It all depends on the lifestyle you are looking for, your priorities and the trade-offs you are willing to make. You should consider moving to the North Shore only if:

You prefer classic old homes in established neighborhoods over newly built sub-divisions. Yes, of course you can find new construction on the North Shore, but most of the homes are older, especially in the communities along the lakefront. In many cases they have been fully renovated so you can have your cake and eat it too. You get the character and charm that comes with a vintage house, yet with all the modern conveniences of a new home.

You love boating, fishing, sailing or going to the beach and are determined to be near the lake so that you can take full advantage of the waterfront.

You want your kids to go to great schools. The North Shore is not unique in this regard. Many of the Chicago suburbs have excellent schools. But New Trier High School and all of its feeder schools continue to represent the gold standard when it comes to children’s education. New Trier’s athletic programs are top-notch, too.

You are willing to pay a premium for a home on the North Shore. It’s one of the costliest places to live in the Chicago area but homes here tend to hold their value better than elsewhere. Even in a bad real estate market, where foreclosures and short sales run rampant, fewer than 1% of the homes on the North Shore are distressed properties.

If the North Shore sounds like where you’d like to live, we’d be happy to give you our signature “Tour of the Shore” so you can get a feel for the area and see if it measures up. We think it’s a great place to live and we love helping people who are relocating here discover all of the wonderful things that the North Shore has to offer. Just give us a call at 847-881-6657 or email us. You can search for a North Shore home here.

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Tags: moving to the North Shore, relocation

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 15th, 2012 at 8:00 am and is filed under Buying a home, Living here. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.