Relocating to Florida

[disneyfor3]

My husband sent some resumes out to different companies in Florida and got an overwhelming positive response. So far he has companies that want to interview him from Ft. Myers, St. Petersburg, Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville and Sarasota.

Would love some opinions on which of these areas are nice to raise a family in with good schools. We have a 5 yo DS who will be starting kindergarten in the Fall. We are looking for an area with homes in the 500k range. Thanks so much.

 

[CPM]

I live in Ft. Myers. We relocated from a suburb of Boston.
My DD is a HS senior, she has had a great seven years of education here. My son is now in third grade, we have had wonderful experiences at our children's schools. We do have school choice here, so it is very important to sign them up at first pick.
It's getting quite expensive here to live. Our home has tripled in value after 7 years of being here.
The pace here is slow, very family oriented.
Nice to be able to hop over to two great beaches in ten minutes! Sanibel Island and Ft. Myers Beach!
Any questions feel free to email me.

 

[CPM]

BTW, yes you should be able to get a nice home in the 500 range. Stay within the south school zone, when looking for a home if you pick this area.

 

[UrsulasMyHero]

I like tampa, but hate the Florida Education system. You'll easily find a home, a very nice one for under $500K. Jobs on the other hand can be.. um.. well you know... boring.

 

[Boater]

If it was me, I'd pick a ciy. Tampa/St Pete, Orlando or Jax.
A wise man once said "old people move to St Pete and their parent live in Ft Meyers". Just kidding Cheryl
$500K will get you a lot of house inland and a pretty close to nothing on the water.

 

[JimB.]

I live in St Augustine, just south of Jax. It is a rapidly growing area.

The school system in Jacksonville S-U-C-K-S.

Many thousands of people live in St Johns County & work in Jax just for that reason.

 

[CPM]

I like tampa, but hate the Florida Education system. .

I haven't found that to be the case at all. That is a pretty generalized statement for such a large state.
My DD went to elementary school in a very nice suburb of Boston. Her education certainly wasn't as good as my son is getting here in Fort Myers.

 

[CPM]

If it was me, I'd pick a ciy. Tampa/St Pete, Orlando or Jax.
A wise man once said "old people move to St Pete and their parent live in Ft Meyers". Just kidding Cheryl
$500K will get you a lot of house inland and a pretty close to nothing on the water.

LOL
I can tell you that isn't the case any more.
Lots of young families have moved here in recent years. Unfortunatly the retired can hardly afford to live here any more. We even have some high rises being built now

 

[CPM]

http://www.lee.k12.fl.us/

Here is our school district home page, in case you would like to look at it.

 

[Mimi Q]

Well, I've been to Jacksonville a few times, and I wouldn't want to live there. (no offense to anyone that lives there)

 

[Sylvester McBean]

we're happy with our school district. we relocated from Illinois and found them to be about equal. the only problem in our area is relocation, they can't build schools fast enough. we have to use school choice to get our daughter into the school we want. that means we have to drive her to school and pick her up.

 

[CPM]

we're happy with our school district. we relocated from Illinois and found them to be about equal. the only problem in our area is relocation, they can't build schools fast enough. we have to use school choice to get our daughter into the school we want. that means we have to drive her to school and pick her up.

That's interesting. So, all the schools aren't school choice in Tampa?

In FM's you live within a zone. When choice comes around you have to put ALL the schools in your zone in the order you want your child to go to them.
Then they do a lottery system and you get a letter telling you which school they gave you. This happens in kindergarten, sixth grade and ninth grade.
You cannot go to a school outside your zone unless you work at the school or it's an IB school. If you are not happy with the outcome, you can be put on a waitlist. Usually you get your choice by the time school starts.
They do provide busses. I swear 14 busses stop at our development each day!
Bad thing is, your child may not attend the same school as your neighbor.
It seems this mostly happened for HS, since the kid has more of a say and the programs vary more.
Nice part is, you can move within your zone and stay in the same school. It also evens the schools out, preventing overcrowding. Most classrooms in elementary school stay under 20 or about 20 in a class.
Schools offerdifferent progras, like full time gifted, science and tech, the arts, IB, and many others.

 

[disneyfor3]

Thank you for the information. School choice - is this the way the schools are run all over the state with a lottery? Where we are now in MD, our elementary is at the top of our street with a total enrollment of 320 and I've already been told since we are so close my son would be in the morning kindergarten. No school choice here.

 

[floridafam]

We relocated from Michigan to Sebastian, Florida.

We love it! The schools here are wonderful!!!! We couldn't be happier.

 

[CPM]

No it's not statewide. Varies by county.
Just an FYI, when we were thinking of relocating to FL some of the other school systems I found very good were Sarasota, Jupiter and Vero Beach areas.