Wellesley or Needham for family with 500k income (Boston, Newton: house, buying)

[massnative71]

Originally Posted by MikePRU

Having a celebration of a town in and of itself is fine. Swellesley celebrating itself is a different thing IMO.

What are they supposed to do then, have a "Let's Humble Ourselves Day" where they all join together and bury their Range Rovers?

[charolastra00]

Originally Posted by MikePRU

Wellesley is mostly "new money." If you want to find large amounts of people enjoying generational wealth look to Weston and Brookline.



That was me. OP said they're not used to hearing these conversations over dinner so I assumed they overheard this while at a restaurant. Either way, I spend more time in Needham than anyone on this forum and I've NEVER overheard such a conversation even once in my 14 years living in this town.



Personally, I have no interest in living in Wellesley. The snob factor is a total turn off for me. If I wanted to move someplace more expensive than Needham I'd rather live in Newton. IMO Newton has more to offer than Wellesley. Wellesley does not have a hugely different offering than Needham to justify the price except for the "name value" meaning you can tell people you live in Swellesley. Any town that dedicates one weekend a year to celebrating itself (The Wonderful Wellesley Weekend) is not someplace I'd want to live. Just me. I've helped plenty of people move there over the years.

Amen to all of this, with the exception of the Wellesley Weekend - town festivals are a gem and a great way to build a sense of place in a time where so few of us live, work, go to school, and socialize in the same town.


I've never heard *anyone* having those types of conversations in public anywhere. That's not to say that it doesn't happen, but you really can't take that as indicative of anything other than the person who is speaking loud enough for you to eavesdrop on.


Honestly, Wellesley feels more of place that someone would feel at home saying their (or their partner's) income is 500K, where Needham, Newton, or Brookline would say their housing budget is 1.5 million. Two very different ways of saying basically the same thing.

[simplexsimon]

I worked with two people that live in Wellesley. One person is the awful type discussed here and the other is a really nice guy who lowered his voice when I asked where he lived.

What happens at Wellesley weekend? I went to my town’s Day for the first time since I moved in and it was actually nice…a bunch of local vendors, food, touch a truck, family oriented stuff. There wasn’t much mention about the town itself…could’ve been any town.

[MikePRU]

Originally Posted by massnative71

What are they supposed to do then, have a "Let's Humble Ourselves Day" where they all join together and bury their Range Rovers?

As a person who spends a lot of time in Wellesley, I can say the people of Wellesley spend most of the year celebrating themselves. So, I don't see why they need to dedicate a weekend to it as well.

[robr2]

Originally Posted by MikePRU

Having a celebration of a town in and of itself is fine. Swellesley celebrating itself is a different thing IMO.

There's a Veterans Day Parade, picnic, concert, and fireworks. Sounds like a celebration any town would have.

https://wellesleywonderfulweekend.com/

[chicagoliz]

Given the state of the real estate market, I'd look at all the houses for sale in both towns. Is there a reason you haven't considered Newton? Some parts of Newton have a suburban feel comparable to Needham and Wellesley.

[simplexsimon]

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

Given the state of the real estate market, I'd look at all the houses for sale in both towns. Is there a reason you haven't considered Newton? Some parts of Newton have a suburban feel comparable to Needham and Wellesley.

She gave a reason, albeit a weird one IMO.

[chicagoliz]

Originally Posted by simplexsimon

She gave a reason, albeit a weird one IMO.

I missed it, and I'm not seeing it on a second pass -- are you thinking of the strip club conversation at a restaurant in Needham? I don't see Newton mentioned at all, anywhere. Or am I just totally missing something?

But, re: the Needham conversation, it did make me chuckle. And I spend quite a bit of time in Needham and am on one of the Needham facebook pages (a holdover from when I thought we were moving there and I never ended up leaving.). I can't imagine that crew engaging in that sort of conversation. They get very upset about dog poop and people having lost all sense of morality.

[simplexsimon]

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

I missed it, and I'm not seeing it on a second pass -- are you thinking of the strip club conversation at a restaurant in Needham? I don't see Newton mentioned at all, anywhere. Or am I just totally missing something?

I don't think it bears repeating but if you do a Ctrl+F for "Newton" in this thread you'll find it.

[MikePRU]

Originally Posted by robr2

There's a Veterans Day Parade, picnic, concert, and fireworks. Sounds like a celebration any town would have.

https://wellesleywonderfulweekend.com/

Clearly none of you responding are familiar enough with Wellesley and the atmosphere in town to understand what I'm talking about.

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

I missed it, and I'm not seeing it on a second pass -- are you thinking of the strip club conversation at a restaurant in Needham? I don't see Newton mentioned at all, anywhere. Or am I just totally missing something?

The OP said something about being Asian but not being comfortable around other Asians because they only speak English or something along those lines. They felt Newton has a higher Asian population than the other towns they're considering. If you look back it's in the original post.

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

But, re: the Needham conversation, it did make me chuckle. And I spend quite a bit of time in Needham and am on one of the Needham facebook pages (a holdover from when I thought we were moving there and I never ended up leaving.). I can't imagine that crew engaging in that sort of conversation. They get very upset about dog poop and people having lost all sense of morality.

The Needham Facebook page is RIDICULOUS and it's not a good representation of the town. The posters are mostly a small very vocal minority combined with a group of people who haven't lived in the town for decades and opine about "the way things used to be" constantly.

I'd list the three main topics of conversation on the page as:

1. People not cleaning up after their dogs or bagging poop and then not properly disposing of the bags
2. Bad drivers driving through town
3. Old homes being torn down and replaced with new ones

Occasionally, there will be a hot local issue like recently there was a lot of talk about the rezoning of the Muzi car dealership. Unfortunately, it looks like that's going to be redeveloped into lab/office space. I think the town really bungled that one IMO.

Anyway, I really don't agree with the way the group is moderated and I've butted heads with the group owner a few times. Her group rules are quite vague and open to interpretation and she picks and chooses how she wants to apply them.

The bottom line is . . . the Facebook group is not really representative of the atmosphere in town.