Hyde Park- Greenwood & 51st St.

[Manigault]

Ray and Murray happen to be great magnet schools where the teachers have received awards. They rival private schools. Ray has a residency district, but folks from other places can apply to get in. I don't think Murray has an actual residency district but I do know it just completed some renovations. What's great about the area is that it has some real good preschools. If you have a kid at Ray or Murray, you can drop the child off at the neighborhood club each morning and then have the instructors walk the kids to school. They do the reverse after school. This is really convenient for folks with jobs outside of HP.

As for $1.5, you can get a SFH within three of four blocks to the lake for that amount in HP. I think the housing costs (and parking) are much more expensive in LP. Check out some of the houses in the local paper: Hyde Park Herald, Chicago's oldest Community Newspaper, since 1882, also featuring The Lakefront Outlook

As to crime, the stated location at 51st & Greenwood is patrolled by city, college and federal law enforcement. A person will be well-protected. Because so many HP people are new arrivals there is a lot more talk about crime in the area than the actual statistics would deserve. Even though it is a company town, most folks in HP are not university connected. There's not a lot of nightlife (except for the Checkerboard) but there's a lot or religion, music and artsy stuff in HP. Its truly a diverse area.

There is restaurant fare in HP for all tastes, despite rumors to the contrary. In addition to upscale Italian and French, there is Thai and Chinese. The joints on 53rd street are too numerous to count and include a cafeteria style egg splatterer, rib joints, fried chicken joints and upscale dining. There are many options.

And, as mentioned by chickaboo, its great to take the bus to the loop (with a bike on the front rack) and then decompress on the way home after work riding down the lakefront.

[chet everett]

Don't forget too that the difference between something right around $1M and something right around $1.5M is HUGE -- it's like looking at cars around $60K vs those at $90K. One group is "expensive" the other is borderline "exotic". The link from Manigault very much bears this out. After 5 - 6 pages of foreclosures (which are only run in that paper because it is so much cheaper than running in the Trib, most are not really in HP) you get to the display ads where you can see ads that describe 4 bedroom Victorian with garage for $899K or a 6 bedroom place with all new mechanicals, double parlor, huge kitchen for $1.3M -- you can't touch those prices in LP! Don't overlook the fact that you gotta be coming to the table with a massive down payment in jumbo territory these days too -- prepare to find hefty rate penalties in the higher loan amounts too.

The other side of the coin is that if you really want to sink $1.5 into real estate you have so many choices these days that you'd be crazy to pull the trigger without checking out the whole package. I've got a real good guess that almost nobody that lives in that price bracket in LP is sending their kids to the CPS offerings. HELLO Francis Parker, Latin School, British School waiting lists... OTOH you DO have people in HP in that price bracket sending their kids to Ray & Murray, Lab School is tiny & costly but the only real option for HS near by. When it comes to public high school Kenwood has been decimated by the pull of Northside, Payton and even a re-purposed / surging Jones. If you are OK with your rich 13-14 year old riding through the city...

If you want to live in an area where damned near all the kids are in the nearby public elementary & high schools even if the parents are in $1.5M houses you really looking at the 'burbs. Total outlay for housing, taxes and education is a calculation that still is completely slanted towards places like Oak Brook & Hinsdale... Every dollar you spend valet parking at a Chicago restaurant comes back to you a hundred fold in not getting sucked by the vampires that set property taxes for Chicago & Cook Co. ...

[Manigault]

Lemme see now. In HP I have HS age kids and their contemporaries are at (in order): Whitney Young, Lab, Payton, Kenwood, Ignatius, Mount Carmel, Kenwood, Jones and King. There's a smattering of south siders at Parker and Latin.

And most folks know that Hyde Park High, alma mater of Amelia Earhart and Herb Kent, is not in Hyde Park.

[chet everett]

You prove my point. I know there are MANY schools in and around Chicago that high achieving students can attend, but from HP they all but Lab & Kenwood involve a commute-- very different than the situation on the north side and completely different than the HS experience of any suburb.
Not saying that everybody should go someplace near to where they live , just saying very very different. Apples & oranges? Maybe more like bananas to kumquats -- one is the ubiquitous fruit available all the time the other is this strange thing that very few people know where it comes from or how to get the best out it. (does Northside Prep succumb to clout/connections? is it any good for any kind of sports? are they rich kids?)

Lab is close, Kenwood used to be a much better option. Hyde Park High(Academy ha!) makes the controversy about safety/diversity/achievement at places like OPRF and ETHS seem like they as far from Chicago as Iraq...

King? Yes it is better than HPA, but isn't sorta like saying that Kuwait is a nice place compared to Iraq -- the invasion happened a long time and they still have a lot progress to make, it ain't never going to pull in folks headed to Dubai or the UAE...

That list of private schools (Lab, Ignatius,Mount Carmel, FP, Latin) mean that you're paying pretty close to a college tuition for four years per kid ON TOP of all your regular expenses. Again, not saying folks don't do it, not saying folks should not do it -- just pointing out that when thinking about any kind of relocation, especially at the upper reaches of expense, it seems prudent to get out the "total cost" calculations.

For some folks the beauty of the south part of the lakeshore, the access to UofC, are worth far more than money...

[Manigault]

Your analysis is still a little off. I did bring up the cost question to an administrator at Ignatius and she said that the graduates are prepared for college scholarships. That's one way of looking at it. Also, the Lab parents who are university-connected (which I am not) get a break on tuition. Finally, I am aware of scholarships for high school tuition (check out Daniel Murphy Scholarship Foundation (http://www.dmsf.org/home.html - broken link)) so there is help for striving parents in the area. There are a quite a few Daniel Murphy scholars from HP at Ignatius and Mount Carmel.

I forgot to mention Hales-Franciscan as an additional high school option.

For the high schools out of the area I think there is a bit of carpooling going on; I'm not sure. But I'm the wrong person to address the commuting issue: I took three buses to get to high school.

[chet everett]

I might be a little off, but I think we are basically in agreement.
If you have $1M to spend you are probably sponsoring Hales-Franscian, not sending your your kid there. Those with many like that send kids into Fenwick or Bro Rice or maybe a legacy think to DeLaSalle (good 'nuff for da' Mare but not his kids...) or hell even Notre Dame in Niles or Loyola in Wilmette -- just long carpool up LSD, my point is/was that the cost and experience is considerably different in HP than the 'burbs or even the north side. Longer commutes, less kids you know in the neighborhood tough schedule if you want sports.

You know all about that if you did the "transfer three times" gig in HS.

The odds of getting scholarship coming out of the FREE Northside or Payton or Whitney Young or Lincoln Park HS might be better than odds of getting a ride coming out of the FREE suburban high school , doesn't matter for the majority of kids that will still have to pay for college coming out of ANY highschool.

Living in HP is no bargain compared to LP or the burbs -- different package.

[chickaboo]

do these radiator takes a lot of maintainance?
I often see it breaks tile flr and change shape of the hardwood floor....

[chickaboo]

with the assessment fee so high, I couldn't help asking: what does the property management company's do? Do they actually maintain the radiators and the window A/C? Or is that tenant's responsibility?

I live in a suburb community where the HOA does nothing but charge us. We can live with that since the property is new and it doesn't need much work. but I can imagine an old house built in 1900's will need a lot of maintenance.

[chet everett]

Generally it is important that older builders have a hefty monthly assessment to keep a reserve fund for stuff that does break that everybody needs. Radiators that are inside your unit will probably not be maintained by the association (and are likely trouble free) but if they are fed from a big older boiler that thing is probably a maintenance headache. Similar with A/C -- in they are true window units (and not thru-the-wall) units I really doubt that is a HOA item. Even for the thru-the-wall type keeping those working is probably something that you are responsible for and won't be allowed to alter the outside apperance. A built-into the unit (like the hotel kind) are more likely to be something that is part of the common elements, as they have split system that circulate chilled /heated water to all the units and you just dial up the temp and fan speed. That is more common in 60s' era places.

High monthly assessments in Hyde Park and other city buildings are also a good way to sort of make the place unaffordable to the wrong kind of people with out giving people crazy high property taxes. A pretty high percentage of condo dwellers in Chicago are older single women who don't mind paying a little more for a place that is safe and quiet... Personally I'd like higher property tax as they are deductible.