Looking to buy house (Pleasanton/Fremont-mission/Almaden)
I work out of Palo Alto and looking to buy a single-family house. Family with 1 kid ( elementary)
Based on my budget (upto 1.5M) I shortlisted following areas
Fremont- Mission district [ great schools and neighborhood but a smaller house for my budget)
San Jose-Almaden [ only elementary schools are good, middle schools are average and only single high school is crowded ]
Pleasanton- All schools are top-notch. Great community and able to get a big house in my budget [ but it adds another 20-30 mins in my travel once office re-open ]
For Pleasanton schools I further checked at GreatSchools, Schooldigger and niche.com and ratings are superb at every place. It looks Fairlands Elementary is highest-rated (https://www.niche.com/k12/search/best-public-elementary-schools/d/pleasanton-unified-school-district-ca/) and comes with a choice of High school. It looks close to BART, high-ways and other shopping centers so i decided to compromise on travel.
Do you think, I can focus on this area in Pleasanton or look at all areas in Pleasanton?
>>Avoided following areas>>
Cupertino/Sunnyvale/Mountain view/Santa Clara- too expensive
Cambrian park- Schools are so so and the whole area is a mess of high extension electric wires
Fremont (except mission)- didn’t get good vibes to live there except mission area ( which I loved).. Rest of the Fremont looks like a fish market ( no hard feelings).. Average schools with inflated ratings
comments
The commute (to Mountain View) pre-covid was a bear, I hated it although I had a company shuttle (not sure about SAP). It's unclear what the future will be for the commute to office. If it's just a couple days a week, it's an awesome trade-off IMO.
I live in Pleasanton Meadows, my kid is a second grader at Fairlands Elementary. Note that elementary schools in the northern part of the town (Fairlands, Donlon, Walnut Grove) are at capacity. When we moved, our kid had to attend Lydiksen for a couple months before they had a spot open at Fairlands. Not a huge deal, but was a disappointment for us to live in walking distance, pay highest property taxes on the street and being unable to attend. It's all history now though.
Feel free to DM me with any questions about the area, will be happy to answer.
Have you visited and walked through different areas of the town? We liked other areas more when we were house hunting, e.g. Birdland, Del Prado, Vintage Hills, but our budget was lower, and we couldn't find a good house there. I think with your budget you should have some good options.
We also loved some areas in Livermore, more than Dublin, it feels very relaxed, but the schools are worse rating wise, so I don't know.
Henry P. Mohr Elementary in Pleasanton is also good.
Explore Dublin as well