Are there any "small towns" in the DC/Baltimore area?

[Neesy228]

We are considering a possible relocation, but the area is stressing me out. So, I thought I'd come here to ask opinions...fellow DISer's always seem to have some great advice!

We are looking for somewhere in the DC/Baltimore area that has a small town feel. Does that even exist? Areas that are Southeast or Northwest of the two metro areas seem to be our best bet. We are willing to go as far northwest as Mt Airy, MD (is that a nice place?) and as far southeast as Grasonville, MD....maybe farther if we really really need to...

We basically want a small town feel. Parks, local activities, some brand stores and restaurants (Target, Applebees type places) would be nice. Also high on the list would be somewhere with small community schools (elementary and middle) that don't have overwhelming numbers of children. And lastly (and budget related) we don't want to spend a million dollars on a single family home on a teeny tiny piece of land...we would like maybe .5 to 1 acres

So, am I asking for something impossible for that area? If I am, I'd rather know that now before we take any job offers.

If you can help, I'd love to hear your advice/opinions.

THANKS!

 

[mdsoccermom]

I live in New Market, right down the road from Mt. Airy. We love, love, love it. This whole area had a very small town feel to us. We have a very involved community, excellent elementary school (National Blue Ribbon school), parks and just a lot going on.

 

[Neesy228]

I live in New Market, right down the road from Mt. Airy. We love, love, love it. This whole area had a very small town feel to us. We have a very involved community, excellent elementary school (National Blue Ribbon school), parks and just a lot going on.

Hi! Thanks for the info!

Could I pick your brain a little bit? Do you know how the traffic is heading down toward the Annapolis area? (we wouldn't be traveling that far each day, just in that general direction) Are the rush hours just as bad as they are in VA? You look at googlemaps and it's estimating a time, but I'm assuming that's without a spec of traffic! And...would you mind telling me how many students are in your elementary school?

Thanks again!

 

[Zim]

Mt. Airy or New Market would be quite a haul to Annapolis. At least an hour and 30 minutes - and that's with NO traffic. If you're just driving to DC, it's more like an hour.

What you can do is go to WTOP news' website and listen live or watch the traffic section. They cover all the area routes. If you're thinking Mt. Airy you'll want to listen for Route 70 traffic. If you might be heading more DC way, then listen for Rt 270.

I live in PA just north of Frederick MD now, and used to live in one of the smaller towns outside Frederick. You can get a single family home with a little land in the surrounding area for about $250,000 - $300K. Frederick has all the amenities you were asking about, without the big city feel. You can go to zillow.com and type in the town and state and properties for sale will pop up and give you an idea of what homes are going for.

ps. sounds like you'd be taking Route 70, which generally is a better commute than 270

 

[My2CrazyGirls]

Where would the job be? There are nice medium sized towns with great schools. You are not going to get an acre though. If schools are top priority then you are looking at spending 400 -500k for a 4 bedroom on maybe .3 of an acrea, maybe . 4 of an acre. But you will be around very educated people, wonderful schools, parks, great community involvement. There are different areas: Columbia, Ellicott City, Elkridge in Howard County. Arnold, Severna Park, some parts of Annapolis in Anne arundel County.

 

[Alison_in_Wonderland]

Your biggest deciding factor is going to be where you need to commute to on a daily basis. Traffic around here is awful (top 5 worst in the nation.) That will be helpful is reccomending towns.

 

[mdsoccermom]

Hi! Thanks for the info!

Could I pick your brain a little bit? Do you know how the traffic is heading down toward the Annapolis area? (we wouldn't be traveling that far each day, just in that general direction) Are the rush hours just as bad as they are in VA? You look at googlemaps and it's estimating a time, but I'm assuming that's without a spec of traffic! And...would you mind telling me how many students are in your elementary school?

Thanks again!

The other poster is right. You're looking at close to 1.5 hrs to Annapolis, maybe a little less. My husband commutes to DC every day which takes him at least an hour each way. There are about 735 kids in the elementary school which is pre-k to 5. The middle school is right next door.

I love Frederick (about 8 miles away) because it's a small city with a small town feel.

Oh, and as far as I am concerned, nothing is as bad as Northern VA traffic.

 

[Neesy228]

Where would the job be? There are nice medium sized towns with great schools. You are not going to get an acre though. If schools are top priority then you are looking at spending 400 -500k for a 4 bedroom on maybe .3 of an acrea, maybe . 4 of an acre. But you will be around very educated people, wonderful schools, parks, great community involvement. There are different areas: Columbia, Ellicott City, Elkridge in Howard County. Arnold, Severna Park, some parts of Annapolis in Anne arundel County.

It's a consulting job...so his work is going to be anywhere between DC and Baltimore to Annapolis to Reston....we're trying to find somewhere in the middle without the chaos.

 

[Wiloughby1]

We live in Owings Mills, which is a bit bustling, but everyone seems to know each other! Our kids go to a private parochial school, but if we didn't have that option, I would have no hesitation sending my kids to our public school.

It's close to Glyndon, though, which is small, nice Victorian houses and newer small subdivisions. Affordable, for Maryland, at least. Most of those addresses go to Franklin Elementary, Middle, and High.

You can also consider Hampstead or Manchester. More rural. North Carroll is a great high school, as is Shiloh Middle.

Olney is also supposed to be very nice, though I don't know much about the schools.

I would also recommend Ellicott City.

 

[Bell30012]

I have family that live in Street, MD. You want a small town feel, that place has it. It's in Harford County, however if you call 9-1-1, it will be a State Police Officer that responds.

 

[luv2sewtjr]

I have one sister in Frederick and another in Hampstead and while I really love Frederick, I would probably pick Hampstead if I had to relocate. I'm in PA about 90 minutes from D.C. right now and while real estate is cheap in my area, I can't recommend the schools...

Frederick has a fantastic restaurant scene and some good schools. It's near the interstates and has become more affordable recently.

Hampstead has the smaller schools and a little less in the shopping department. If you have athletes, that part of Carroll County has athletics at all levels.

Howard County and Montgomery County have good schools, but it's more suburban than rural there.

 

[edk35]

I live in Severn, Anne Arundel County...tons of small areas for you to live in around here. Crownsville, Arden are close to Annapolis and yet kind of out in the "country" so to speak. Crofton and Gambrills are nice areas too. We are close to all the shopping malls, restaurants, good schools but not too close to either big city.

 

[My2CrazyGirls]

It's a consulting job...so his work is going to be anywhere between DC and Baltimore to Annapolis to Reston....we're trying to find somewhere in the middle without the chaos.

For that type of commuting i would say Anne arundel County. Pasadena has homes with larger properties and schools are still good. Like pp said, Gambrills, Crofton, Crownsville would be good options as well. It would depend on your budget too.

 

[North of Mouse]

The other poster is right. You're looking at close to 1.5 hrs to Annapolis, maybe a little less. My husband commutes to DC every day which takes him at least an hour each way. There are about 735 kids in the elementary school which is pre-k to 5. The middle school is right next door.

I love Frederick (about 8 miles away) because it's a small city with a small town feel.

Oh, and as far as I am concerned, nothing is as bad as Northern VA traffic.

We lived in Gaithersburg, MD 17 yrs. ago and 270 traffic was terrible then. Also, even at that time, we did not consider Frederick a city with a small town feel. It would have to be much more bustling now There were a lot of open land farms north of Frederick then, but no land or homes that I know of are very inexpensive there - were expensive even then. Good Luck Not to discourage you, but we were so happy to leave all the traffic behind. If you have to drive toward the cities for your job, you WILL encounter very much traffic.

 

[mdsoccermom]

We lived in Gaithersburg, MD 17 yrs. ago and 270 traffic was terrible then. Also, even at that time, we did not consider Frederick a city with a small town feel. It would have to be much more bustling now There were a lot of open land farms north of Frederick then, but no land or homes that I know of are very inexpensive there - were expensive even then. Good Luck Not to discourage you, but we were so happy to leave all the traffic behind. If you have to drive toward the cities for your job, you WILL encounter very much traffic.

I guess it's a matter of perspective. I lived in Gaithersburg for a year, then Germantown for 11 years before moving here 7 years ago, and the area definitely has a small town feel even though Frederick is a small city. The area is very close knit and it quite common to always bump into people we know, no matter where we are in the area. Something that never happened while living in Montgomery County. There are also definitely affordable homes in the area (just thinking of a few in my neighborhood) as well as more expensive ones.

 

[alh921]

Based on the possible locations you or your husband may be commuting to on a daily basis, an ideal location would probably be somewhere in south-western Howard County (Clarksville, Fulton/Maple Lawn, Dayton, Highland, etc.). A central location between Baltimore and Washington, coupled with a good high school district, will drive the home cost up significantly. It even varies greatly down to the specific high school that the home feeds into (for example, Centennial, Marriotts Ridge, and River Hill High School tend to drive the house values up, whereas housing will be a little more affordable in the Long Reach, Howard, Wild Lake regions).

Western Howard county (Glenelg, Marriottsville, Dayton, Highland, Fulton) has large homes and can often have good-size plots of land tied to them. Land is what holds the value, though, so the prices can be anywhere from 500k to well over $1 million. If you jump over the county line into Carroll County, the prices are more affordable and the schools are still very good (ranked about the same as the median Howard County schools). I would recommend looking at Sykesville/Eldersburg area. It's a much less congested feeling (more small town/rural) than you will find in Ellicott City and Columbia, but it has everything you need and you will only be about 15 to 20 min from Ellicott City's main drag so you can easily jump between environments. You could also look into Westminster, which is a little too far for me, but for others it may be tolerable. Also, you mentioned Mt. Airy -- while I haven't been there myself, I know people who came from that area and they seem to really like it.

I think Frederick feels kind of far for a daily commute, but I know people that commute from Frederick every day, and also from as far as Pennsylvania into the Columbia area every day. Because of all of the government workers in the central MD and DC area, traffic is pretty much terrible regardless of where you live. It's taken me more than 45 minutes to get from point A to point B before during peak rush hour, when in normal circumstances it would have taken <10 minutes. You may find that you will either want the convenient/shortest commute, or more house for your money in a potentially nicer/safer area. Rush hour from some areas (especially west coming from Frederick and Carroll Counties) can last from 6:00am - 8:30am. All routes get congested - I70 Rt32, etc. People get around it by either leaving really, really early for work (I know people who arrive to work at 5:30am every morning), or they just plan for the traffic and adapt. I can't speak for Anne Arundel traffic, because I haven't really investigated that area much.

I would recommend looking at the MTA webpage to review the public transportation options available. Some towns and park-and-rides have commuter buses that go into DC and other metro areas every day, and there is also the MARC train that goes between Baltimore and D.C., and the D.C. metro (bus and rail) systems. One thing I regret about my location is that I have NO public transportation options, so I have to fight the long commute every day. It would be nice to be able to read a book or wind down without being white-knuckled on the steering wheel every day for long stretches. Also, if you are open to public transportation, it opens up the options of Baltimore County (north of Baltimore City) & parts of Montgomery County (though much of it is very congested).

 

[TwinPrincessMama]

I want to 2nd exactly what the last person said. Highland/Fulton are blink and you miss them but right next to slightly larger small towns. I can go into the stores there (even in Clarksville and Maple Lawn) and know people. Maple Lawn is a new "planned" community that is very nice. My parents were looking to buy into it.

New Market/Mt Airy are very nice but I wouldn't consider Fredrick a small town at all. I also love Skyesville, it has a nice downtown and a nice historic area. I was actually planning to move there but it would have put me too far from my job.

Someone mentioned Olney, which is more than a suburb than a small town but it does have that small town feel most of the time. Downside: it's very expensive.
When I first moved to this area 20 years ago Damascus was a small town, but I'm not sure it is anymore.

 

[Neesy228]

Based on the possible locations you or your husband may be commuting to on a daily basis, an ideal location would probably be somewhere in south-western Howard County (Clarksville, Fulton/Maple Lawn, Dayton, Highland, etc.). A central location between Baltimore and Washington, coupled with a good high school district, will drive the home cost up significantly. It even varies greatly down to the specific high school that the home feeds into (for example, Centennial, Marriotts Ridge, and River Hill High School tend to drive the house values up, whereas housing will be a little more affordable in the Long Reach, Howard, Wild Lake regions).

Western Howard county (Glenelg, Marriottsville, Dayton, Highland, Fulton) has large homes and can often have good-size plots of land tied to them. Land is what holds the value, though, so the prices can be anywhere from 500k to well over $1 million. If you jump over the county line into Carroll County, the prices are more affordable and the schools are still very good (ranked about the same as the median Howard County schools). I would recommend looking at Sykesville/Eldersburg area. It's a much less congested feeling (more small town/rural) than you will find in Ellicott City and Columbia, but it has everything you need and you will only be about 15 to 20 min from Ellicott City's main drag so you can easily jump between environments. You could also look into Westminster, which is a little too far for me, but for others it may be tolerable. Also, you mentioned Mt. Airy -- while I haven't been there myself, I know people who came from that area and they seem to really like it.

I think Frederick feels kind of far for a daily commute, but I know people that commute from Frederick every day, and also from as far as Pennsylvania into the Columbia area every day. Because of all of the government workers in the central MD and DC area, traffic is pretty much terrible regardless of where you live. It's taken me more than 45 minutes to get from point A to point B before during peak rush hour, when in normal circumstances it would have taken <10 minutes. You may find that you will either want the convenient/shortest commute, or more house for your money in a potentially nicer/safer area. Rush hour from some areas (especially west coming from Frederick and Carroll Counties) can last from 6:00am - 8:30am. All routes get congested - I70 Rt32, etc. People get around it by either leaving really, really early for work (I know people who arrive to work at 5:30am every morning), or they just plan for the traffic and adapt. I can't speak for Anne Arundel traffic, because I haven't really investigated that area much.

I would recommend looking at the MTA webpage to review the public transportation options available. Some towns and park-and-rides have commuter buses that go into DC and other metro areas every day, and there is also the MARC train that goes between Baltimore and D.C., and the D.C. metro (bus and rail) systems. One thing I regret about my location is that I have NO public transportation options, so I have to fight the long commute every day. It would be nice to be able to read a book or wind down without being white-knuckled on the steering wheel every day for long stretches. Also, if you are open to public transportation, it opens up the options of Baltimore County (north of Baltimore City) & parts of Montgomery County (though much of it is very congested).

This is all fantastic information! Thank you so much for taking the time to write all of this out! I will investigate the areas you mentioned!

 

[Mickeyluver37]

Right in the middle of the DC/Baltimore/Annapolis triangle would be Crofton, Odenton, Gambrills. For Odenton, stick to the Piney Orchard area- not the side by the base. I live in the area and have never had problems getting to those three big cities, but it depends on where in DC you are trying to go. There is a MARC train right in Odenton and Piney Orchard even has a community bus that goes to the station. I LOVE it here- community gyms, pools, shopping, and access to everything you could ever want.

However, my lot is measured in FEET, not acres. Im ok with close neighbors- love having BBQ's in the summer, sounds of kids everywhere. We do have plenty of common areas and playgrounds, bike trails, ball fields, even a nature preserve. A SF home here is 400-500k. Townhouses vary greatly in size and are 250k-450k.

A pp mentioned MapleLawn in Howard County which is absolutely gorgeous. But most of the prices are at least 100k higher so it really depends on your budget. The schools in Howard County also have the leading edge on Anne Arundel.

Some of these places you are mentioning are way too far to commute to DC, IMO. Grasonville would cost daily bridge tolls not to mention the traffic, and I don't think the schools over there are that great. That said, I have a friend who lives out there who not only has land but raises chickens. Houses out there are under 200k.

 

[buckirj1]

I'm another who thinks that Howard County, MD is probably the most centralized location, if for no other reason than its very good public transportation options, and the diversity of housing types. In the interest of fairness, I live in the area. The best local resource I've found for commuting options is http://www.howardcommutersolutions.com. I'm not affiliated with it in any way, but it's mighty useful. Good luck with the move.