When relocating to the Atlanta area, you’ll be faced with a plethora of options for housing. It can be overwhelming to try to narrow down your search. To help you make sense of it all and find your ideal location, I encourage you to answer the following questions first:
- Where will you be working? Traffic in Atlanta can be brutal; so it is very important to consider what your commute will be like. Strangely, distance to your job is not the only thing to consider. There are certain intersections that are notoriously bad and certain areas that have more alternate road options than others. I have personally lived in many parts of the Atlanta metropolitan area and have a great knowledge of notorious bottlenecks as well as back road alternatives and I am always sure to pass this information along to my clients as I guide them in their relocation decisions.
- What style home do you like? Many of the homes within the city of Atlanta are historic craftsman style homes that were constructed in the early 1900’s and many have been recently renovated. The suburbs offer more traditional style architecture as well as contemporary. Additionally, there is a lot of brand new construction in Atlanta. If you have at least $800,000 in your home budget, then you can get nice new construction just about anywhere; including some city neighborhoods. If you are on a more modest budget and age of your home is a high priority limitation, then you might want to eliminate the city neighborhoods and focus your search on some suburban areas.
- Are schools important to you? If you have school aged children who will be attending public schools, you will want to focus your search on some of the areas with top performing schools. Use the school report page on this web site to research school test scores and other data that can be used to compare various schools.
- Consider property taxes: The Atlanta metro area is made up of several relatively small counties and the property tax rate can vary significantly from county to county. Additionally some counties offer special discounts to senior citizen residents that can save you as much as 80% on your tax bill.
- How much do you consider your home a financial investment? Certain areas have historically appreciated faster than others. Still others previously neglected neighborhoods are being considered by investors as neighborhoods on the brink of significant improvement. Everybody wants their home to go up in value; but some will compromise where they live and choose to live somewhere that is less desirable in other ways to them just to see a significant gain in price. Of course, any prediction of future value is complete speculation. However, if I know that this is a priority for my clients, I will help them evaluate the historical appreciation rates as well as analysts predictions.