Family of Six Moving to Seattle. Overwhelmed with Rental Options?!?!

With a big family, you'll probably steer clear of downtown condos. You'll be looking at one of the outlying neighborhoods, probably in the City of Seattle proper. We live in one of the northern neighborhoods, Ballard. It has reasonably good access to public transit to get downtown (although the commute might be 30 to 40 minutes) and pretty good public schools. The neighborhoods all have different personalities.

Most of the northend neighborhoods are similar with good transit and schools (Wallingford, Phinney Ridge, Maple Leaf, Laurelhurst, Roosevelt, Bryant, View Ridge). I'm not as familiar with the southern neighborhoods (Georgetown, Columbia City, Beacon Hill). There are also a number of cool east-Seattle neighborhoods (Capital Hill, Madison, Madrona, Mt. Baker), but I'm less familiar with them. Check out West Seattle, as well, although the commute becomes a hassle when the bridge is out.

If you choose to locate outside of the City, Northshore School District has good schools. Your husband should still be able to catch a bus downtown pretty easily, although you might have to drop him off at a park-n-ride near I-5.

Eastside of Lake Washington (Redmond, Bellevue, Kirkland, Issaquah, etc.) is pretty nice and probably have good schools, but they are quite suburban. Not quite as neighborhood-y or walkable as some of the Seattle neighborhoods.

If you want to have a single car, I'd recommend picking an in-city neighborhood.

Good luck. Atlanta to Washington is quite a change. It's around 50 degrees cooler here today than most of the country and probably won't break 90 degrees this summer (defined as last half of July, August, and first half of September) more than a couple times.

For general info on children's activities, check into the Red Tricycle (Seattle) and Seattle's Child websites. That will give you an idea of recreational options, at least.

Wow, get ready for culture shock! The good news is that Seattle is a fantastic city with lots of culture and activities... the bad news is that Seattle is a very expensive city and the weather is especially draining with little kids.

We've since moved from Seattle to Boise, ID for a better quality of living, but I can share with you our choices when we moved to Seattle (from Washington D.C. so we were already city-folk) with our then one year old son.

The city schools aren't the best, but there are pockets of good schools within the better neighborhoods. In my opinion, the high schools are their biggest challenge so you'll have a few years to do research before you find what's best for your kids.

If you stay within the city (which I highly recommend, the commuting sucks worse than D.C., and that's saying something!) most of the neighborhoods have small elementary schools with personalized attention. When I say, "in the city" I don't mean downtown. There's a big difference. Also, public transit is just OK, so careful selection of your neighborhood is important if you really want to have only one car. For example, my husband worked in Fremont which is just north of downtown. In the car it was an easy 15 minute commute. By bus it was an hour+ with two transfers. Now, if he had worked downtown, that was only about 20 minutes by bus, with maybe one transfer depending upon where you need to go downtown.

In my research, the city neighborhoods with the best elementary schools were Madison Park, Montlake, and Mt. Baker. We were fortunate enough to rent a great house in Madrona ($2200/month for point of reference, for a 3 BR/2 1/2 BA bungalow with a yard) which is in between Madison Park and Mt. Baker, and the elementary school seemed nice enough (although most of the local parents worried there were too many low income kids in the school).

I should caution that in Madrona, Leschi and Mt. Baker, there's a dividing line of sorts, between the haves and have nots (you'll notice the change in house size and quality, the further away you get from the lake) and the affluent parents primarily send their kids to private school. Just something to keep in mind if you envision your kids walking to school with the neighborhood kids.

That same dividing line also means there are some sketchy areas mixed into these neighborhoods (although not in Madison Park) so do your research and check out the areas in person. It's like any city -- things can shift block by block.

There are also several family friendly neighborhoods just north of the city that you should consider: Ballard, Wallingford, Green Lake and Phinney Ridge. Of these, I recall Wallingford had the better schools. A little to the east there's Ravenna, Maple Leaf and Wedgwood. I think Wedgwood has one of the best elementary schools in the city, if I'm remembering correctly.

This is long enough so shoot me an email if you'd like to talk further. I've moved cross-country three times and did another state-to-state move with our son, so I've got tons of advice on moving if you want it.

Good luck!

You would be crazy to try and live with 4 kids in downtown Seattle. It would be OUTRAGEOUSLY expensive. Plus, you would be paying for parking...either on the street or in your apartment. My girlfriend lives on Capitol Hill (not exactly downtown, but really stinkin' close) and is not all that happy with her school choices for her son at ALL. (he is 11)
I was just over in West Seattle the other day and it is so charming! I don't know what the commute would be like, but it's definetly something to look at. I live on the Eastside, the commute to Seattle would be about an hour I think. Not too bad, really. Plus, our school districts are some of the best in the state. You would have a much better chance of getting a house as well. We just moved, so I can tell you that when we were looking at house rental prices for a 4 bedroom we were looking at about $2,000 and up.
Good luck,
L.

I am a born and bred Seattleite ... have lived here all my life. I have lived North, South and East of Seattle. It really depends on what type of neighborhood you are looking for. Seattle Public schools aren't terrible, but there are a LOT better options if you branch out into the suburbs. I agree with Karen about Issaquah ... really great community, famly oriented, and convenient to downtown Seattle if your hubby doesn't mind riding the bus. I actually live in Maple Valley which is more rural but we love it. My commute ito Seattle from where we live would be about 45 minutes to an hour.

If you want an older home with "character", there are a lot of great neighborhoods just north of the city proper, like Ballard, Phinney Ridge, or Laurelhurst, View Ridge, Lake City, etc. Queen Anne Hill is a beautiful charming old neighborhood directly north of the city but most of the homes are pretty expensive with little to no yards and no garages (old homes built in the early 1900s with only street parking which can be super hard to find).

If you are looking for more of a "development" neighborhood with lots of kids and families, then you will definitely have to move further out of the city like Shoreline, Edmonds, the East Side (i.e. Bellevue, Kirkland, Issaaquah). Fortunately for us (but unfortunately for people moving into the state), our real estate market has stayed somewhat stable and prices here are probably higher than you are used to in Georgia so be prepared for rents to be high. Most of us here are just used to longer commutes so that we have the best of both worlds, good schools for our kids, great family-oriented neighborhoods, but also city living and entertainment around 30 - 45 minutes or so away.

Good luck to you!!

Commutes into Seattle can be awful. But, Issaquah on the Eastisde is wonderful! It's right off I90, park n ride/bus stop in eastgate which has a direct route downtown. Better schools than downtown, bigger, newer homes to choose from, space, close to shopping, mountains, lakes & Seattle.

Seattle schools can be alright, if you're in the right neighborhood. I'd stick to east or north of Seattle personally, the only exception being west Seattle in the gatewood/Alki/admiral areas (Lafayette, Alki, gatewood elementary school neighborhoods). We love Edmonds, just north of Seattle by about 20-30 minutes, or I'd live in the north shore school district (northeast of Seattle). But too far to the eastside (better schools and neighborhoods altogether) will make for a hellish commute to downtown. I love The Ravenna, Bryant, sand point, laurelhurst, Madison park, wallingford, ballard, and queen anne areas of Seattle.