(part one of two)

The Best, Most Popular Neighborhood in Charlottesville is …

Mill Creek. Redfields. Western Ridge. Bellair, North Downtown?

All of the above. None of the above.

The real answer to, “what is the best neighborhood in Charlottesville” – depends on you.

What does “best” mean to you?

Most popular? I could answer that by looking at the search data to determine what are the “most searched” neighborhoods.

How do you define “best” neighborhood ?

There are a lot of factors that go into the equation of “is this the ‘best’ neighborhood for me? These are some –

– What are you looking for? Most appreciation in the past five years? Ten? Twenty?

– Most walkable? (what is walkable to you?)

– Proximity to grocery stores? Which one? Whole Foods? Trader Joe’s? Fresh Market? Kroger? Harris Teeter? Foods of All Nations?

– Most stable? – (surrounding areas are already built up, with no adjacent/nearby fields threatening to be developed)

– Most families with kids? – (I can’t help with that)

– Most people “like you”? (A common request – most often the context is politics, education, etc, but I stay out of this conversation as well)

– Best schools? – (what is “best”? High SOL scores? Lowest number of fights? Most walkable/neighborhood-centric? MESA program? STEM? Partnerships with colleges? Sports?)

– Closest to your work? (What is “close”? Our region has relatively low commute times – ranging from less than five minutes to an hour, with the median being ~30 minutes)

– Closest to day care? – (a big factor for a lot of families)

– Newest homes? – (see the following)

– Biggest variety of homes? – (Some have deep aversions to cookie cutter neighborhoods, while others are indifferent)

– More democrats than republicans? – (Will you fit it politically? Why do you care?)

– Public transit availability? – (Learn about the Charlottesville Area Transit system, and read one account depicting all of the Charlottesville bus routes)

– Safest? – (The definition of “safe” is very dependent on the buyers’ threshold – some from big cities have different interpretations of “safe” than those from less populated areas.)

– High percentage of owner-occupied homes?

So far, there’s no algorithm that can advise a buyer which neighborhood is “best” better than fantastic human intelligence – in the form of a great real estate agent who:

– Listens

– Knows the area

– Advises appropriately

– Everything is google-able. Not everything is findable. Or discernible.