Des Moines Nesties
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Relocating to DSM, need neighborhood info
We are thinking of relocating to DSM and have been looking at some houses online. We know we want to live IN Des Moines and a few neighborhoods have stood out to us.
1. Beaverdale - this seems to span a huge area though
2. South of Grand
3. Waterbury
We are looking for a charming home around $160k and since we have an almost 2 year old and one on the way a good school district and family friendly is important.
Are these good neighborhoods to narrow our search to? Are we missing some great ones? We are both originally from Iowa so we are vaguely familiar with the area.
Suburbs are out of the question.
Thanks!
***Nestie Bestie w/ TheDeatons***
Re: Relocating to DSM, need neighborhood info
Those are all great neighborhoods! To be honest with you though, it is going to be really hard to get into #2 or 3 w/ your budget. When we first started looking for homes we looked at waterbury and S of G we couldn't find anything that wasn't a fixer upper w/ our budget, which was higher. We would have loved to be in either of those neighborhoods.
I think if you are willing/able to put in some elbow grease, you MAY be able to find something in the waterbury area, but S of G starts around $400k from our experience. (correct me if I'm wrong, ladies, I haven't looked in a while).
There may very well be some cute little bungalow in waterbury or S of G that we just didn't clue into b/c we wanted more space. I just know that to get what we were looking for in a house in terms of space, we had to choose somewhere else to afford it.
Beaverdale, on the other hand, has some adorable homes that would be right in your price range.
I agree w/All-His.
Beaverdale is totally doable. It's the neighborhood I grew up in and I would live there today if we had been able to find a house we could afford. If you're looking for charming, I'd look between about 38th and 48th Streets and south of Douglas.
South of Grand is pretty well out of the question and there isn't much in Waterbury valued that low, much less on the market.
Have you looked into the South West side of DSM? Near the airport and off of Park Ave?
I know for a fact there are a few great houses for sale in my neighborhood, that are lower than your price range, but still great houses! Close to downtown, easy access to the interstate, parks, schools and churches.
If you want more info on where to speciffically look let me know!
I know the house at the end of our street has a huge lot, big attached garage is something like 1580sq ft? for $110k. (also the further end of our street there is a park with a wading pool & tennis court)
Not that I know of.....would you mind PM'ing me the street address and I'll see if I can find it on MLS? We were searching from $200k to $130k and didn't think to look below because we weren't sure if the neighborhoods would stay quality at that price range.
I have found 2 or 3 houses for under $200k that claim to be in Waterbury and South of Grand so maybe the realtor used the neighborhood in there loosely.
***Nestie Bestie w/ TheDeatons***
There are some cute houses S of Grand that will be in your price range; however there are very few of them and typically they need some work. I have a friend that lives S of Grand and is surrounded by 500K + houses, but she is in a home around 160k - again, there are very few options but at least there are some. They also tend to sell very quickly.
I work over by Beaverdale and there are some adorable houses! I had never really been over here and I was pleasantly surprised how cute and well-kept a lot of these homes are.
These were my thoughts exactly! S of Grand will be a challenge but it may be possible if you move on something quickly and you are willing to put in the time/money to fix up some of the house.
I second Beaverdale. I think that's a great "neighborhood" feel where people still really want to know the people living around them and grow up as a community. Very cute, good schools and definitely affordable.
disclaimer: totally JMO and nothing personal
i'm guessing if beaverdale, south of grand and waterbury are your preferred neighborhoods, you might not be thrilled with the south side. again JMO and nothing personal.
The Polk Blvd area is another neighborhood similar to SOG and waterbury, but they are usually $200k+. You might find some of the charm you are looking for in a couple different parts of windsor heights/merle hay area. (which starts to run into beaverdale)
I know it's your opinion, but what part of the SS are you refering too?
The Park Ave places are HUGE and there are some amazing homes over there. I'm just wondering. Same goes for the Easter Lake area, nice majoirty in the Carlisle district, and still close to downtown/by-pass...
Are you planning on staying in the home until your child goes to school? If so, you might want to consider school districts as well- Des Moines Public vs. suburb schools.
We live outside the metro and the sense of a smaller community and school was a big factor for us.
Just my two cents...good luck!
)
i wasn't referring a part of the ss. i was referring to the location as a whole.sog, beaverdale and waterbury are more centrally located to the metro area and suburbs.
It was just the way you phrased it, "won't be thrilled" that was kind of snarky, like saying the SS is low class, that there can't be $200k homes over there.
That's how it came off.
We just aren't suburb people. We enjoy living in the middle of everything and then driving outwards if there's something we want to do.
And yes, I'm going to stay home until the kids go to school, then they'll go to public school, which is why not going to the subrubs might be a little tricky, because I'm sure the schools (and families) there are great.
***Nestie Bestie w/ TheDeatons***
where did i say it was low class or anything about $200k homes? or even imply that? and how did my second post not clarify that for you?
ETA: where did i say something about there not being $200k homes on the south side?
That's how it came off.
I didn't say that's what you said, "less than thrilled"
I don't get it? the SS is close to DT/interstate/WDM too.
I'm not totally directing this at you, I just really annoyed when someone says crap things about the SS.
I'd take the SS over SOG/Waterbury area anyday! H works for the city, the sewer sytems SOG are horrible, they're always down there because someones yard has been backed up.
And now I may be coming off as snarky as my back is up, it's thinking like the 'less than thrilled' that deturs people from the SS.
Okay - "less than thrilled with the location, as it is not AS CENTRALLY located as the other neighborhoods."
i didn't say crap things and while i realize that some people do have a bad opinion of the ss, i'm not one of them.
It's definitely a personal choice. I don't know how familiar you are with the DM area, but the suburbs definitely have more to offer than just a place to sleep. There's plenty of shopping & entertainment.
Have you had a chance to visit the different neighborhoods to decide what amenities you would like to be closest too. Have you considered a short term rental before buying?
Who knew we were so close! I am a beaverdale girl to and I looked at a LOT (31 in 7 days to be exact) of houses and looked all over the dsm metro area, including the burbs, and I LOVE where we ended up. Beaverdale is a great family friendly neighborhood. I had never been in DSM for more than a couple days when I came looking at houses, I just didnt feel like you get the same 'charm' of these homes anywhere else. There are also some great sized lots in beaverdale, I have almost a half acre.
I love Jordan Creek mall just as much as the next person but we're pretty set on finding an older (1920) charming house. I think we'll definitely take your suggestion on a short term rental.
***Nestie Bestie w/ TheDeatons***
We moved here from out of state 7-8 months ago. I honestly believe that when moving out of state the best thing is to start off with a rental. I feel like after about 6 months I had a better feel for the area and where we wanted to live. Our REA (appointed by the company DH took a job with who relocated us here) contacted new construction and houses on the market for awhile to see if they would be open to a short term rental. Surprisingly to us, we were able to see many new construction homes and a few within a few years old. The rental market, in the DM area is not that great IMO but we were lucky that this other path was available.
The neighborhoods you specified were on our original list as well. I've seen every home 500k->up in those areas plus in the suburbs. We were dead-set on being in DM for culture and diversity.
I created this pretty intense spreadsheet on every elementary, JH and HS in the area which included data about: school rating, age of school, number of students, ratio-teacher, diversity broke out by race, free lunch program, reduced free lunch program, average salary for the area, average age of adults, ratio of adults to children in home, and so forth. Some of this clearly might sound bizarre but it all plays a role in socio-economics of a community, crime, and quality of school.
We decided that Greenwood Elementary was the best school for our family based on the factors we were looking for - diverse school, good rating, mostly two parent homes, parents with higher education, and average salary.
But we really didn't like any of the homes - beautiful homes for sure but if I'm going to spend 700K on a home - I don't want to have to put 300K in it to bring it up to more modern standards.
We finally found a lot in S. of Grand that we felt might work for us but working on the sale of the lot with the developer was like pulling teeth and we walked away.
IN the end, we decided to sacrifice diversity for lower crime, better schools, and fresher neighborhoods with parks everywhere ... Clive/Urbandale area. We are planning to build out here.
It's funny after spending some time here how one's direction can change. Good luck to you!