Relocating/Employment

Hi all,

My wife and I are looking to relocate to the Charleston area in the next 12 months. We are in our early 40s with a 13 year old son. So far we%26#39;ve decided that Summerville, Goose Creek or Moncks Corner would make for good housing areas. We%26#39;d like 3-4 bedrooms, a 2 car garage on about a 1/3 of an acre or a little larger and are thinking we can get that for around $250K or less.

Employment is our biggest concern and after reading some posts, I%26#39;m having concerns. I%26#39;m an IT Manager with 15+ years experience, I also teach a course at a local college and coud consider a career change into teaching, but I doublt thats where the money will be. I%26#39;m looking to earn around $85K. My wife is in Sales, more specifically she works for a temp (to permanent) staffing agency and would be looking to make around $50K. We are also considering partnering with her current employer and opening a staffing agency.

We%26#39;ve done some research on places we%26#39;d like to live as far as things to do and way of life and Charleston keeps coming to the top of our list, but being able to afford it is another issue.

Please be brutally honest as we are planning to come down in the next 8 weeks to possibly buy some property.

Relocating/Employment

While Charleston is a wonderful place to live and raise a family, you are right to be concerned about employment. Having lived all over the US, I finally returned home 3 years ago and was very surprised to see the extremely large increase in the cost of living here. While housing may be a bit more affordable than up north, unfortunately the salaries do not match the housing prices here. When I moved back home from Boston, it was challenging to find a job that would pay 1/2 of what I was making there but finding housing that was around the same price I paid in Boston was pretty easy. Honestly, I think it will be difficult for your wife to find a job around $50K. You may be able to find the salary you%26#39;re looking for in the IT field and teaching. I would recommend looking at our newspaper%26#39;s site (www.charleston.net) and check out the jobs section. You may also want to look at Trident Technical College (www.tridenttech.edu) for adjunct positions.

As far as the 3 towns you mentioned, I would suggest Summerville (where I actually grew up) as they have better high schools. Moncks Corner is really what we consider country here and Goose Creek while it does have some good spots, is just not a place I would want to live. If you live in Summerville, your son would go to either Summerville High School or Fort Dorchester...both are very good. For Moncks Corner, you%26#39;re looking at Berkeley High (where I went my freshmen year until my high school was built) and let me say that it was pretty scary back then!! For Goose Creek, you%26#39;re looking at either Goose Creek High or Stratford High (where I went my last 3 years). If you choose Summerville out near the 194/Jedburg exit, your son would go to Stratford if you%26#39;re in Berkeley County. You said you wanted brutal honesty, right ? :)

As far as housing, you should be able to find something in your price range in the towns you mentioned. The only thing you may not find is the acreage you mentioned...most subdivisions come with 1/4 or less. Of course if you go out to Moncks Corner, you would probably be able to find more land.

Again, the Charleston area is a fabulous place to live and raise a family but I think you are wise to be concerned about employment. We have more blue collar jobs here than white collar. Definitely check out the newspaper and Monster/Career Builder/Hot Jobs.

Best wishes in your search!

Relocating/Employment

Just want to say that I agree with everything travelgirl said. We got major sticker shock when we moved here. There is a misconception that homes in the south are cheap and affordable, while that might have been true at one time, that has changed over the years with the influx of people. Also, just want to add that Summerville is getting another high school that should be opening in the 2007-2008 school year. Stratford by the way, is the high school that got all that national publicy when it had the drug raid in the hallways? Remember that? Anyway, my husband went to a football game at Stratford and he said it was a scary crowd. Just being honest here.

You might be able to snag something in Summerville with a little more land in around your price range. Home costs have certainly gone up around here lately but every now and then I will see some good buys. Don%26#39;t expect the home to be brand new, something like you are talking will most likely be an older home. Nothing wrong with that, there are some nice older homes around here. ;) If you can afford to bump up your price range a bit you could probably find something out in the Legend Oaks area. It%26#39;s a nice area where new homes are being built around some older ones (they have bigger yards too) and it would put you in the new high school district. If you have any more questions feel free to ask. Good luck!

Travelgirl and ncjjm thanks for the honesty, it is greatly appreciated! We actually visted Summerville last summer and even drove thorugh the Legend Oaks area and were impressed. My wife is a little worried about earthquakes and Hurricanes, but if we want to live in the South close to the coast, we%26#39;ll have to deal with it. Moncks corner still interests us, but what could we expect realistically for drive times to a from work if we lived in that area and had to go to either North Charleston or downtown Charleston? ALso the same question if we lived in Summerville?

Back to employment. From the figures I%26#39;%26#39;ve been able to find, unemployment is around 5% and as you said a majority is blue collar and I%26#39;ll venture to say a lot is tourism based. I%26#39;m curious with all the new housing developments and population growth (I%26#39;ve read some areas have doulbed in size in the past 10 years), is this compounding the employment issues? I%26#39;m guessing a lot of the new influx is from Northerners (from PA) like myself, who want out of cold, but obviously not all of us are retirees, so we have to work somewhere. What efforts have been/are being made to draw in new employers??

There are 2 other areas were starting to investigate: Wilmington, NC and Myrtle Beach (my wife%26#39;s mother retired there). I know this really isn%26#39;lt the right forum, but anyone familar with these areas and the employment/ housing outlook. Looks like Wilmington has a low unemployment rate of about 3.1% and Myrtle Beach is only slightly better than Charleston (4.6%) .

Again thanks for any info you can provide. Charelston is still our top pick and we%26#39;ll be down later next month to check on some housing developments again. I%26#39;ve got my resume on Monster and careerbuilder.com, so we%26#39;ll see what happens.

Actually I lived in Wilmington for 11 years before we came to Charleston. It was a great place to live when we first moved there, but we watched it change drastically over the years. Too much commercialism, overdevelopment and a population explosion has ruined it in my opinion. We call it the concrete city now. Traffic is rated most dangerous in the entire state (gets real bad during the summer and holidays) and it ranks pretty high on the crime index. It also is a hurricane magnet. We went through 6 of them. Housing prices have skyrocketed there the last couple of years too, so homes are not so affordable as they once were there. If you were to consider that area, I would recommend living outside of Wilmington in Brunswick County. That%26#39;s the hot spot there now.

Myrtle Beach? Hmmmm, how can I put this. Commercialism, Commercialism, Commercialism. Traffic, Traffic and MORE Traffic in the summer. Seriously, it%26#39;s a great place to visit, but I wouldn%26#39;t want to live there.

It takes us roughly about 30 minutes drive time to downtown Charleston from Summerville. North Charleston around 20 minutes. That is not driving in rush hour though. I%26#39;m fortunate to not have to deal with rush hours. I don%26#39;t really go to Moncks Corner so I can%26#39;t really say the drive time, but I would assume that it would take a little longer from there.

I wouldn%26#39;t let the concern about hurricanes and earthquakes worry your wife too much. Charleston does site on a pretty good size fault and has little quakes pretty much every day, you%26#39;d never know it as they are so very tiny (nothing compared to the quakes when I lived in LA). As for as hurricanes are concerned, we have so many barrier islands, that Charleston is actually pretty protected from most of the storms...though we do have our share of them. We are very fortunate that our city, county, state officials and citizens actually work very well together during natural disasters.

Moncks Corner could be up to an hour drive from downtown and 30 - 45 minutes to North Charleston during non-rush hour. Unlike S%26#39;ville, Moncks Corner doesn%26#39;t have direct access to the interstate and you have to go through Goose Creek to get to the interstate.

I wish I could say that a great deal is being done to bring in white collar jobs but honestly, I personally don%26#39;t feel enough is being done. Yes, the influx of folks is definitely influencing the unemployment rates here.

I have to agree with previous post re: Myrtle Beach. A great little getaway if you%26#39;ve only got a few days but so not a place I would want to live. Myrtle, like Charleston, has pretty much become a year-round destination for folks but Myrtle is far more commericalized than Charleston.

Best wishes with your decision!

I do not mean this in any negative manner - but one of the reasons the increase in the cost of housing has out paced the increase in salaries is that so many people from the northeast appreciate our area and are moving in. Often these are retired people with substancial savings and alot of money to invest after selling expensive property in other areas of the US. They have the money to spend and the cost seems a bargain to them compared to many other areas of the northeast or west coast. Charleston has the most expensive housing market in the state, but it is a beautiful and highly desirable area to live, so more people want to come here. I personally would not want to live in any other city in South Carolina.

I know this does not apply to your situation (you would probably be GLAD to be a rich retiree, haha) but it does help explain the discrepancy.

Well the job hunt has begun; I%26#39;ve sent my resume to a few opeining s I saw. I guess I%26#39;ll wait and see what the next several months brings. We%26#39;ve widened our destination to include Charleston to Savannah.

We%26#39;ll be down later next month to check out housing in some of the communities, Summerville in particular.

Thanks for all your honest input and again if you have anything else to offer, please feel free to chime in.

Another question for the experts on housing and schools.

We already plan to check out the Summerville area and the experts have somewhat steered us away from Goose Creek and Moncks Corner, but what about other areas, like West Ashley and Mt. Pleasant? How are the schools in those areas? I know housing is steep in Mt. Pleasant, but haven%26#39;t checked out too much in West Ashley. Are private shcools really the way to go over public? Again we%26#39;d like to spend around $250K to get 3 bedrooms on about 1/4 acre. Thanks!

You won%26#39;t get a house like you describe above in Mt. Pleasant for $250k. Maybe in West Ashley, I am not in tune with the real estate over there, but it could be hard. Also, look at James Island. We don%26#39;t have children so I cannot give you an honest view of the schools, just that we know lots of neighbors and friedns%26#39; kids go to private schools.

The real estate prices in West Ashley aren%26#39;t much better. To give you an example my husband and I just purchased our 2nd home. We are moving to a neighborhood down Hwy 61. The house is 1 story we are going to have 3 bedrooms (small) and a 1.5 baths. I think that it is not even 1200 sq. feet. No garage however just a one car carport and we paid right about $189.

I think that if you can find a nice house in Summerville that would be my choice. I personally did not want to drive that far out of the city because I work downtown and West Ashley is closer.